PROSPERING FARMERS
OUR MISSION
Improving cocoa farmers’ resilience through increasing their cocoa productivity and diversifying their income sources.
CHALLENGES
Cocoa is typically produced by smallholder farmers in rural equatorial areas. The supply chain faces considerable challenges such as farmers with limited resources to invest on their land, high child labor prevalence, aging trees, depleted soils, climate change effects, strong price volatility and a lack of basic community infrastructure.
Together, these challenges have led to consistently low productivity levels and, in many regions, stagnating or shrinking cocoa production. Cocoa prices are highly volatile; prices can experience exceptional years of high levels and then return to lower levels. However, for many farmers, even periods of high prices do not translate into lasting income security: low yields and price instability continue to limit earnings, leaving households unable to reinvest in their cocoa farms to improve soil health, rejuvenate their plantations and mitigate the effects of climate change.
The current cocoa farming model requires significantly higher investments than what is currently implemented, approximately 7.5 times more i.e. from 120$/ha to 900$/ha. This implies investments in pre-harvest labor, inputs, planting material, and agroforestry to unlock full potential and improve farmers’ incomes.
Working towards a living income for cocoa farmers requires modernizing cocoa farming through innovations, mechanization where possible, and stable access to key inputs, which will ultimately secure long-term cocoa supply.
Furthermore, there is a need to strengthen the enabling environment through policies that reflect real investment needs - such as R&D, knowledge transfer, and implementation of good agronomic practices that are essential for systemic change.
OUR APPROACH
Our approach for farmers to prosper is to focus on the key enablers allowing increased yield and farm resilience.
In practice, this means strategic focus areas:
1- Soil management as a holistic approach to increased and long-term cocoa productivity
2- Labor investment to drive cocoa yields, especially pre-harvest practices
3- Investment in R&D of cocoa planting material
4- Integrated Pest and Disease management to sustainably tackle threats to cocoa productivity
5- Agroforestry as key component of the recommended farming model
INITIATIVES FROM THE FIELD
Explore our examples of impactful initiatives across the supply chain, showcasing the hard work, dedication, and innovative approaches at the heart of our mission.
