Ghana Light-Crop Cocoa Declines

... Because of Smuggling
Ghana, the world's second-biggest cocoa producer, purchased about 3 percent less beans from farmers during this year's light-crop season because of smuggling, a Ghana Cocoa Board official said.

COCOABOD bought 13,613 metric tons of beans from growers by the eighth week of the season, compared with about 14,000 tons in the same period a year earlier, the official, who declined to be identified in line with board policy, said in an interview yesterday in the capital, Accra.

In July, the board said it expected to receive as much as 40,000 tons of the beans, compared with 50,000 tons last season. Fewer controls and poorer-quality beans in neighboring Ivory Coast, the world's biggest cocoa grower, enable Ghanaian farmers to fetch higher prices for their crop in that country. The board is working with security agencies in Ghana to reduce smuggling.

Ghana produces about a fifth of the world's cocoa. The light crop, which began in June, ended today, Robert Kwabena Poku Kyei, a special adviser on cocoa at Ghana's Finance Ministry, said by phone from Accra. He didn't provide further details.