By Emmanuel Bruce
ACCRA (Reuters) -Ghana’s cocoa regulator said on Tuesday that increased disease incidence caused by prolonged rainfall and not enough sunlight could lead to moderate production decline, after farmers called for state intervention to mitigate the impact of bad weather.
The West African country, the world’s second-biggest cocoa producer, has seen output fall in previous seasons due to diseases, adverse weather conditions and rampant illegal gold mining, which destroys cocoa plantations and reduces yields.
An association of Ghanaian farmers warned last week that cooler temperatures, excessive rainfall and not enough sunlight had reduced yields and raised the risk of fungal diseases including black pod disease.
That in turn could blow a hole in farmers’ incomes and cause long-term damage, it said in a statement.
“We visited these 72 cocoa growing districts and we witnessed fungi being spotted on the various cocoa trees due to the climate conditions,” Nana Oboadie Bonsu, the farmers’ association’s president, told Reuters.
In response to the concerns raised by the association, the Ghanaian regulator COCOBOD said it had intensified mass spraying and disease control programmes.
“While it is too early to provide definitive figures for the current season, preliminary assessments suggest that production may see a moderate decline compared to earlier projections,” the regulator told Reuters.
COCOBOD also said it aims to complete the planned distribution of fungicides before the peak harvest period to minimise yield losses.
COCOBOD data showed in May that Ghana was likely to miss its output target of 650,000 metric tons for the 2024/2025 season.
(Reporting by Emmanuel Bruce; Editing by Anait Miridzhanian, Robbie Corey-Boulet and Tomasz Janowski)
