Tontro(ER), Oct. 21, GNA - Stakeholders in the cocoa industry world-wide attending the Seventh Regional Executive meeting on cocoa visited two distinct cocoa farms at Tontro in East Akyem District of the Eastern Region on Wednesday.

The field trip was to expose them to local knowledge based farming systems and opportunities in the introduction of technical innovations into cocoa production.

"The visit is to expl ore some of the constraints affecting small holder cocoa farmers from achieving higher yields" Mrs. Cynthia Prah, Communications Officer of Sustainable Tree Crops Programme, an organisation which caters for the interest of cash crops in Ghana said. The farms belonged to Dr. Joseph Bekae Akonnor, a retired entomologist of Cocoa Research Institute of Ghana (CRIG) who practised scientific farming and Mr. Oscar Tawiah, a 52-year-old man who was into pure local farming. It was detected that yields from Dr. Akonnor's farm were far higher than that of Mr. Tawiah due to the appropriate use of the required insecticides, fertilizers and fungicides.

While Dr. Akonnor used hybrids from Ghana Cocoa Board and had healthy looking cocoa pods and average tree height of two metres, Mr. Tawiah who used seedlings from his farm had some of the pods blighted by diseases and an average tree height of five metres.

Dr. Akonnor's farm produced 120 bags of cocoa beans last year on an 8.4 hectare while Mr. Tawiah produced seven bags of cocoa beans last year on a 1.15 hectare within the same period.

Mr. Bill Guyton, President of World Cocoa Foundation urged cocoa farmers to embrace a more scientific approach to farming and take instructions from cocoa research institutions for increased yield. The stakeholders who embarked on the trip were from Ghana Cocoa Board (COCOBOD), Cote d'Ivoire, Nigeria, Liberia, ECOWAS, and cocoa processing companies, Archer Daniels Midland ADM Cocoa, Barry Callebaut, Cadbury plc and Nestle.