Cocoa Farming Facts

History of Cocoa

• Native to the upper Amazon basin, cacao trees, the source of cocoa beans, require constant warmth and rainfall to thrive - they grow best in tropical regions of Africa, Asia, South America and Central America, within 15-20 degrees of the equator.
• Many of the countries that are in the unique position to grow cocoa depend heavily on the crop's successful production to help sustain their economies.
• Although cocoa has a history of human consumption dating back some 2,000 years, the full extent of its contributions to the global economy, its social, economic and environmental benefits to farmers and their communities, and its health benefits for consumers, are only now being fully realized.

Challenges for Cocoa Farmers

• Around the globe, rural communities may struggle economically and have little access to social services. For many communities in tropical areas, cocoa has proven to counter these challenges by being more than just a commodity. It has become an economic engine, a means for poverty alleviation and a conservation tool.
• Every year, many cocoa farmers lose one-third or more of their crop due to lack of relevant education and training, diseases, pests or rudimentary farming techniques. If the farmer experiences environmental difficulties, including poor soil conditions, his yield can be reduced by 50 percent. This has a potentially devastating impact on small farmers whose livelihoods depend on the returns from healthy crops.
• Economic conditions and the political environments of cocoa-producing countries are sometimes uncertain, providing an unstable environment for the farmers and their families.
• The cocoa community has already been victim to tragedy - in the 1990's a fungal plant disease, Witches’ Broom, destroyed 75 percent of the Brazilian cocoa crop. Brazil, formerly one of the world's major cocoa exporters, became an importer of cocoa to meet its own growing domestic consumption needs. At roughly the same time, Malaysia suffered similar losses in its cocoa sector to an insect pest, cocoa pod borer, plaguing the crop.
• Currently Indonesia, the world's third largest producer, is afflicted with the same insect pest (cocoa pod borer) and suffers annual increasing crop losses that threaten the survival of cocoa.

The Cocoa Farmer

• Globally, there are between five and six million farmers who depend on farming cocoa for their income, while more than 26 million people rely on some part of the cocoa industry for their livelihoods.
• Small family farmers are the heart of the cocoa industry, growing 90 percent of the world's cocoa crop. As a result, the crop contributes significantly to the well-being of farming families and their communities.
• In West Africa alone, there are more than two million farms typically two to three hectares in size (five to eight acres) that may grow around 2,500 cacao trees, yielding an average of one metric tonne of cocoa. More than 10 million people in West Africa live on cocoa farms.
• In Cote d'Ivoire, the world's largest grower of cocoa beans, cocoa growing provides more than 50 percent of rural household income.

Cocoa as an Industry

• The production of cocoa is a U.S. $4 billion a year industry. Over three million metric tonnes are produced annually worldwide - about 25 percent of this is consumed in North America, with 50 percent in Europe. The remaining 25 percent is consumed throughout Asia, Latin America and Africa.
• The global chocolate industry actively supports economic development in Africa, as Cote d'Ivoire derives 40 percent of its total export revenues from cocoa exports.
• The confectionery industry provides income to many people around the world - employing more than 270,000 people in Europe and approximately 65,000 people in the United States - when the distribution and sale of these products is taken into consideration, the employment effect triples.