By Nicholas Osei-Wusu
President Akufo-Addo has assured cocoa farmers in the country of better days ahead regarding improvements in their welfare, with a predicted stable cocoa price on the international market of at least $1,600 in the ensuing years.
He mentioned a 3-tier Pension Scheme for cocoa farmers starting this season with the Ghana Cocoa Board (COCOBOD), contributing ₵175.5 million while encouraging the contributing farmers to save part of their earnings from their sales towards a decent old age and retirement from active farming.
President Akufo-Addo made this known at Tepa in the Ahafo Ano North Municipality of the Ashanti region at the official opening of the 2023–2024 cocoa season.
President Akufo-Addo, while eulogising cocoa farmers of old and now for their sustained substantial contribution to the national economy over the years despite the inherent challenges of their work, assured that the government is committed to improving their welfare, saying that ‘there are better days ahead’.
He used the opportunity to announce the new producer price for the product, starting September 9, 2023.
He declared, “Today, cocoa prices have increased from ₵12,800 per ton to ₵20,943 per ton or ₵1,308 per bag. That price is 70.5% of gross FOB price and it’s equivalent to $1,821 per ton. It is the highest to be paid across West Africa in some 15 years.”
The announcement of the new prices caused a spontaneous eruption of jubilation among cocoa farmers at the event when President Akufo-Addo announced that a bag of cocoa beans will now sell for ₵1,308 instead of ₵800.
This compelled President Akufo-Addo to temporarily hold on to his address to allow the ecstatic farmers to pour onto the turf of the Agyemang Prempeh Sports Stadium venue of the event to dance to the popular song ‘As3m Papa Bi a M’ate’.
Government has now changed the official start of the annual cocoa season from October to September.
This, according to the government, is to help cocoa farmers plan properly, particularly in securing finances for their wards’ formal education.
The new arrangement is synergizing the start of a new academic year during which most cocoa farmers, though had their beans ready for sale, had to borrow to send their children to school.
At the durbar of stakeholders to open the 2023-2024 cocoa season were members of various farmer groups, traditional leaders, government functionaries, civil society groups, and agro input dealers.
The Chief Executive Officer of COCOBOD, Joseph Boahen Aidoo, assured that Ghana is now ready to meet the regulatory requirement instituted by the European Union, scheduled to take off in January 2025.
According to the EU regulation, from 1/1/25, the EU will boycott cocoa beans whose source cannot be traced to a legal source.
The COCOBOD CEO assured that Ghana is the only country in Africa which has a national cocoa traceability system in place to meet the new international trade requirement.
The Minister of Food and Agriculture, Bryan Acheampong, expressing serious concern about the increased cases of cocoa smuggling in the past two seasons, warned that there will be no more room for the perpetrators to operate again.
“Mr. President, Nana Chairman, I only have one assurance to give to the nation—I’ll not disappoint Ghanaians to stop smuggling; I’ll not disappoint Ghanaians!” he stressed.
Some of the farmers, who had traveled from various parts of the Ashanti and Ahafo regions to listen to the new prices, told GBCNews that the new price for a bag of cocoa beans is far beyond their expectation of ₵1,000 and thanked the government for the decision.
“Today I’ve received a very pleasant piece of news. I never expected this margin of increase. I’m very happy. We thank Nana Addo,” Opanin Yaw Owusu Ansah said.
Madam Afia Pomaa, also a cocoa farmer, said, “what Nana has done is beyond our imagination. We cocoa farmers have today received the most gratifying news. We’re aware of the various social interventions, and for him to have done this for us, we can only ask for divine blessings for him and his government.