ICCO sees Ivory Coast cocoa output at 2 mln tons in 2024/25, says source

By Ange Aboa

ABIDJAN, Oct 15 (Reuters) – The International Cocoa Organization (ICCO) sees Ivory Coast’s cocoa production reaching 2 million metric tons in the 2024/25 season compared with 1.8 million tons last season, an ICCO expert told Reuters, speaking on condition of anonymity.

West African neighbours Ivory Coast and Ghana are the world’s top two cocoa producers, but adverse weather conditions and plant diseases hit output in 2023/24.

“We believe that Ivory Coast’s production will return to an acceptable level of 2 million tons, even if it will still be below the usual average,” said the expert, referring to the average seasonal production of 2.2 million tons over the three seasons preceding the 2023/24 drop.

For Ghana, the ICCO does not expect production to exceed 500,000 tons in 2024/25 due to issues related to artisanal gold-mining and the prevalence of swollen shoot disease, which affects about 40% of Ghanaian plantations compared with 15-20% of those in Ivory Coast.

In Ghana, a source at the cocoa regulator rejected this estimate as speculative, while acknowledging that swollen shoot will pose a significant challenge to local cocoa production in the coming years.

Four cocoa exporters and three pod counters who follow the sector in both countries said the weather will play a key role in determining the volume of output in 2024/25, particularly conditions in early 2025, when farms contend with the dry Harmattan wind and seasonal rains.

Ivory Coast’s Coffee and Cocoa Council (CCC) is aiming for maximum production of 2 million tons of cocoa in the coming seasons, said a source at the regulator.

“This year we think we will get close to that. Our forecasts are between 1.9 and 2 million tons, but it’s still too early to say. There is too much rain currently, and the flowers have fallen, and some cherelles have died,” the source said, referring to developing pods.

The director of an international cocoa export company based in Abidjan was equally circumspect about the outlook.

“Do I share the ICCO expert’s projections for this season’s production? Yes, but I remain cautious,” the director said.

“We really don’t know why production dropped so much in a single year (2023/24), and it’s not just because of the weather conditions,” he said. (Editing by Alessandra Prentice and David Evans)

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