Ghana’s cocoa industry experiences disproportionate benefits even with record prices – 2025 Cocoa Barometer

The 2025 Cocoa Barometer brings renewed attention to Ghana’s cocoa sector, highlighting persistent farmer poverty, inequitable value distribution, and insufficient enforcement of sustainability measures, despite improved macroeconomic indicators and record global cocoa prices. The report, produced by a coalition of civil society organizations and research institutions, finds that although inflation and stable exchange rates have offered limited relief, most Ghanaian cocoa farmers remain below the living income threshold. “Cocoa producers continue to bear the greatest risks while receiving the least returns,” it notes, emphasizing that Ghana and Côte d’Ivoire, which together account for over 60 percent of the world’s cocoa supply, retain less than six percent of the total value of the industry. The Barometer attributes this disparity to the structure of the global cocoa trade, in which multinational chocolate companies and traders exercise considerable pricing power. “A fair price must transition from mere rhetoric to tangible reality,” it asserts, cautioning that even initiatives such as the Living Income Differential (LID) will not result in substantial change without enhanced transparency and stronger farmer representation in pricing decisions. The report also underscores the urgent need to address productivity challenges, aging plantations, and climate-related stresses, while advocating for expanded domestic cocoa processing to increase local value capture. “Value addition within producing nations must be regarded as an economic necessity, rather than a mere aspiration,” the report states. Beyond pricing concerns, the document addresses intensifying environmental challenges. Illegal mining, known locally as galamsey, continues to threaten cocoa-producing regions by damaging farmland and contaminating water sources. The Barometer warns that unchecked environmental degradation could irreparably harm Ghana’s production capacity and its global standing in sustainable sourcing. To prevent this situation, a unified policy approach is suggested that includes enhanced land governance, incentives for sustainable agriculture, and closer collaboration with development partners to rehabilitate degraded cocoa landscapes. The results highlight an urgent appeal for policymakers to align Ghana’s macroeconomic recovery with substantial reforms that guarantee prosperity reaches the nation’s most vital producers, its cocoa farmers. In the meantime, the Government of Ghana announced on October 2, 2025, a notable increase in the producer price of cocoa for the 2025/2026 season, raising the price from GHS 3,228.75 to GHS 3,625 per bag. This marks a 12.27% rise and equates to GHS58,000 per metric tonne, an increase from the previous GHS51,660 per tonne. Share this: Click to share on Facebook (Opens in new window) Facebook Click to share on X (Opens in new window) Like this:Like Loading...