Cocoa farmers in Edo State have decried the lack of government financial support to boost the quality of cocoa production and revive the moribund industry.
The farmers said if the government invests in the sector to support cocoa value chain, then the quality of cocoa can meet international quality specifications and they can compete with their contemporaries in terms of production rate.
“In the 60s, Cocoa was the cash crop that was used to develop the nation. Today, there’s nothing coming from the state or Federal Government, we are just working on our own, and it is affecting cocoa production in the state,” Thomas Ekpenriebe, Edo State chairman of Cocoa Farmers Association, told journalists in Benin City.
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Ekpenriebe urged the government to capitalise on the prospects of exporting cocoa, saying there are enormous benefits in the sector that can generate foreign exchange and create employment opportunities for Nigeria’s teeming youths.
He said Edo State has the best quality of cocoa owing to concerted efforts by relevant stakeholders and the lesser rain recorded between June and August 2020, compared with previous years.
While identifying unfavourable climate, fire outbreak, COVID-19 and lack of regulatory boards as major hindrances to the sector, he advocated the re-establishment of cocoa boards to regulate the influence exerted by middlemen so as to help to revitalise the sector.
“The middlemen have always been there, there is no control unlike when we had Cocoa Board regulating the activities, so that we can identify licence buyers, but it is like an independent market.
“Today, the federal and state governments are not regulating. Even if we as an association want to fight it, how long can we do it? So, the middlemen are always there,” he added.
