It is the race in the West African cocoa sectors to sell in advance, before the end of September, a good part of their 2021/22 harvest. A usual exercise which notably allows the two countries to set their minimum guaranteed price to the planter. The stakes are therefore high.
According to officials of the Ghanaian Cocobod and the Ivorian Coffee-Cocoa Council (CCC), the situation in the two countries, formerly rivals and now allies, would be very different.
In Ghana, the regulator has so far sold only 350,000 tonnes (t) of beans against a target of 600,000 t, a Cocobod official told Reuters . In addition to this disappointing volume, the Cocobod would certainly have obtained the payment of the decent income differential (DRD or LID in English) of $ 400 per tonne but would have had to apply a negative origin premium of – £ 100 to – £ 130 per tonne. tonne.
As for Côte d’Ivoire, it is pleased to have already sold contracts for 1.18 million tonnes (Mt) of beans in 2021/22, confident that its target of 1.6 Mt at the end of September will be reached.
For the two countries, the last contracts concluded would have been with Olam, for 100,000 t for Côte d’Ivoire and 50,000 t for Ghana. The Singaporean multinational would have agreed to pay the decent income differential (DRD or LID in English) of $ 400 per tonne but would have obtained a discount on the original premium, of the order of £ 200 for Côte d’Ivoire and from £ 100 to £ 130 for Ghana. Olam has not commented or confirmed the information.
Finally, note that arrivals of cocoa bags graded and sealed the Ghanaian Harbor totaled 960 982 t from 1 st October to 10 June, up sharply compared to 752,639 t in the same period last year, according to the figures released today by Cocobod. Ghanaian production should approach one million tonnes and reach 950,000 tonnes this season.
