Nigeria’s cocoa loses market traction as old trees, bad weather cut supply

Nigeria’s flagship export product, cocoa, is fast losing its traction in the global market, owing to increased number of un-replaced old and worn-out trees in the country and bad weather, both of which have combined to cut supply.

Nigeria, the world’s fourth largest cocoa producer and supplier, saw the value of its global supply decline by 59 percent, from $666.4 million in 2014 to $270.7 million in 2015, according to the country’s non-oil export data, compiled by Cobalt Services, and obtained by BusinessDay.

Industry players say there will likely to a ten to 15 percent decline in production capacity in 2015 when the numbers for the year are released.

The Cocoa Association of Nigeria thinks that this could be much higher, saying that cocoa output might decline by as much as 60 percent in 2015, owing to poor weather.

  “Weather is responsible for the drop in the country’s cocoa output,” said Robo Adhuze, chief operating officer, Centre for Cocoa Development Initiative.

“We experienced a long drought in 2014/2015 season and the weather has been very harsh. Most of the crops in the south-west of Nigeria were affected. It was only in Cross River that we had some respite, but yields in the south-west dropped,” Adhuze said.

  Nigeria’s two cocoa harvests include the smaller midcrop from April to June, and the main crop from October to December. The midcrop normally accounts for about 30 percent of Nigeria’s cocoa output.

Like oil palm and rubber, Nigeria is losing a huge export earner to low investment, lack of government support and natural vagaries.

This is a big blow for a country which was the topmost cocoa producer in the 60s, but now lags behind Ivory Coast, Ghana and Indonesia. The crash in cocoa supply is also coming at a time that prices of ICE and Liffe cocoa beans have seen a spike and at a period when the country has lost over 60 percent of its revenue to oil price lows.

Inability of Africa’s biggest economy to sustain and improve its production of cocoa over the years has led to sharp decline in productivity to below 0.350 tons per hectare, when other leading countries produce between two to five tons per hectare of improved variety.

“Nigeria currently produces less than 500kg of dry bean per hectare. This very low level of cocoa production has made it necessary to change protocol of production,” Daniel Adewale, a former crop scientist at the Cocoa Research Institute OF Nigeria (CRIN), said at the USAID/ Nigeria/ NEXTT training  recently.

“The country is no longer getting full economic benefits from growing cocoa because most cocoa fields are old and small, as well as the poor genetic qualities of the planting materials used,” Adewale said.

According to Ranjana Bhattacharjee, senior researcher, International Institute of Tropical Agriculture (IITA), Ibadan, for Nigeria to get it right, then it must use high quality planting materials in the right environment, while management plus market demands must all be linked and developed to increase cocoa yield.

“Globally, the chocolate and cocoa industry are in crisis due to low productivity which is failing to meet a growing demand that is increasing by two percent annually,” Ranjana added.

Local industries, particularly multinationals, which have embarked on backward integration, say they get their supply at the required quantity and quality.

“We are getting enough supply,” said a senior official in a company that produces chocolates.

“The truth, however, is that cocoa business has some constraints, but we still do not have challenges  in quality and quantity,” the official added.

Agricultural activities in 2016 have been predicted to experience significant decline, following disclosures by the Nigerian Meteorological Agency (NIMET) that most parts of the country will experience less than normal volume, delayed, and early cessation of rainfall.

Experts who spoke with BusinessDay attribute this to climate change, which is now affecting the agriculture cycle, thus making irrigation farming the only way to cushion the effects of inadequate rainfall.

“The time has passed for farmers to be solely relying on climate-fed agriculture as the climate changes,” Akpan Imeh an expert said recently at the training of service providers by USAID Nigeria in cocoa producing states.

Imeh stated that Cote D’Ivoire has expanded its cocoa productivity above Nigeria and every other country because it has evolved the cultivation of cocoa beyond the traditional ways which rely on climate. “If the soil forms a bond, then the soil will be able to withstand a lot of water stress but if there’s no bonding, irrigation is badly needed,” he added.

But farmers have complained that lack of finance and inadequate government support have made it difficult for them to adopt irrigation farming. “lack of funds coupled with inadequate government support which, even when in existence, hardly trickles down to we smaller farmers, make it difficult for us to adopt irrigation,” said Oladokun Wasiu, a  cocoa farmer in Iddo local government area of Oyo state.

ODINAKA ANUDU & JOSEPHINE OKOJIE