"PROFITING FROM COCOA AS DEMAND RISES IN ASIA'S EMERGING MARKETS"

Big future and money in cocoa drives investments and potential for plantations to switch to the golden crop . It is also rated as a good time to “buy” the bean.

According to Mr Dennis Melka – CEO of United Cacoa ,comparing cocoa with palm oil, you will get about 6 tonnes of oil per hectare for palm oil, which, at a price of about $600 a tonne at the moment, gets you to revenues of about $3,500 per hectare, whereas for  cocoa, you produce about 3 tonnes per hectare, but at about $3,000 per tonne, meaning revenues of $9,000 per hectare.

Being the first stock market-listed, pure-play cocoa producer, United Cacoa aims to be the world's biggest cocoa supplier with its development of a targeted plantation area of 3,250 hectares in Peru and which is set to deliver its first beans this year.

Peru and neighbouring Ecuador is termed as the "Silicon Valley of cocoa" for their research into the bean, and development of varieties such as the  “game changing “ CCN 51 type  with good yield potential, and resistance to the diseases.

Chinese consumption, in cacao terms, , is poised to rise 40% between 2013-18, Euromonitor believes. To compound the impending shortage Malaysian production is down and Indonesia is now importing cocoa,  a reflection of a growing domestic processing industry too.

Meanwhile West Africa, the top producing region, which is still beset by Ebola and key producing countries of Ivory Coast and Ghana, where political upset remains a worry will have profound consequences for the country and its future cocoa supply.

Shortage or surplus ?

For the past few weeks, the global media has been highlighting fears that the world is facing a cocoa shortage of catastrophic proportions.

Yes, cocoa prices have shown a continuous upwards trend but are claims of a 1 million metric tonne deficit by 2020 overstated to the extreme ?

ICCO calculations show that supply deficits are indeed likely to occur over the next few years but"stocks of cocoa beans should cushion this development .  According to new reports, ICCO now expects small deficits over the next 5 years with shortage of only 100,000MT in 2020 rather than 1M m to deficit .

That is provided that production is not threatened by pests and diseases and good agronomy practices are implemented.

What are the new innovative techniques in cocoa agronomy to improve yield andqualities of cocoa ?

There is a growing interest in fine flavor cocoa varieties and carefully crafted products. Hear from India’s artisan chocolate producer how the market is evolving to appreciate finer chocolates and top trends and consumer preferences for chocolate consumption.