Climate Change Worsens Plight of Nigeria’s Cocoa Farmers
Nigeria was a leading cocoa producer over three decades ago, but production has declined due to several reasons. Premium Times’ Abdulkareem Mojeed in this special report identify factors contributing to the declined production and how it has affected cocoa farmers especially in the Southern regions where in the past was one of the foremost foreign exchange earners for Nigeria.
His report:
The appearance of sun rays in the partly cloudy sky on Monday morning in early July excited Dorathy Friday, a cocoa farmer in Ikom, Cross River State. She had feared that the relentless rainfall would spoil her freshly harvested cocoa beans.With a long wooden spatula, the farmer spread the fermented cocoa beans on a large tarpaulin spread on the ground in her compound. Her aim was to ensure that the beans were evenly exposed to the rising sun.On that day, the surrounding air was filled with the smell of cocoa.“The heavy rainfall is affecting the cocoa,” Mrs Friday laments. It was the first time in almost a month that the town was experiencing warm weather. But she knew that the beans only needed a few hours of sun and warm air before she bagged them for sale.“If the rain beats the cocoa, it will not dry well and it will have mould,” Mrs Friday said.The activity of sun-drying cocoa beans that Monday morning was a common sight across Okondi Ikom. Largely subsistence farmers, the people grow cocoa mostly, but also vegetables, maize and cassava in the surrounding farms.Ikom is one of the local government areas famous for cocoa plantations. The town lies a few kilometres from the Cameroon border. The Central African country is another major cocoa producer, contributing about 70 per cent of the world’s cocoa beans alongside Cote d’Ivoire, Ghana and Nigeria. Proximity to Cameroon offers trade opportunities to Ikom and has inspired its young dwellers to embrace cocoa farming, instead of joining the rush to the cities to look for white-collar jobs.However, production has been declining in this community as in other cocoa-producing areas across Nigeria. This has been blamed on climate change, increasing population with its attendant urbanisation, and the absence of regulatory control in the cocoa value chain in the country.Data from Nigeria’s Meteorological Agency (NiMet) shows that the duration and intensity of rainfall have increased, causing flooding in many parts of Nigeria as witnessed last year between August and October. Findings from a tour of cocoa farming communities in the major cocoa-producing states of Nigeria show that unpredictable weather conditions are contributing to the decline in the production of cocoa, like other major cash crops in the country.Poor agronomic practices, market structure, lack of quality farm inputs and reliable farm data are some of the other factors. The situation is taking a huge toll on farmers’ productivity and livelihoods as most of them remain poor despite the huge wealth being made in the cocoa value chain globally. Cocoa bean is the major raw material for the $100 billion global chocolate and cocoa confectionery industry.In Nigeria, farmers look at the past for the glory days of the cocoa industry. “We cannot compare our production in the last 10 years to when our parents were in charge due to the degrees of rainfall we are currently experiencing,” Agbo Bassey, a cocoa farmer in Ikom, says.He said, they expected a bountiful harvest in the community last year but the rain came unexpectedly and destroyed much of the crops.“We had a large level of black pod infection due to the rainfall,” the farmer said. But they fear for the same experience this year. “What we have been seeing in the past three weeks has been constant rainfall on a daily basis.”Mgbe Aya, another cocoa farmer in Ikom, said he now produces less than when he began farming 20 years ago. However, his biggest concern has been the depletion of soil fertility in his farm. “I inherited my farm from my father. The trees are now old and the soil is no longer fertile like before,” he said.Nigeria’s shrinking cocoa productionIn the 1950s and 60s, cocoa was a major agricultural export commodity in Nigeria, and a top foreign exchange earner for the country.Before it was displaced by crude oil (discovered in commercial quantities in the 1970s), agriculture was the mainstay of Nigeria’s economy. The country was the second-largest producer of cocoa globally. From 1960 to 1969, the agriculture sector accounted for an average of 57 per cent of Nigeria’s Gross Domestic Product (GDP) and generated about 64.5 per cent of export earnings in the country.During this period, the government of the Western region of Nigeria used proceeds from cocoa exports to build major edifices like the 26-storey Cocoa House, the first television station in Sub-Saharan Africa – the Western Nigeria Television (WNTV) – and the University of Ife, now Obafemi Awolowo University. However, from 1970 to the late 2000s, the sector’s contribution to GDP and export earnings steadily declined, as Nigeria’s focus shifted to fossil fuel exploration.Nigeria’s rapidly increasing population and urbanisation also means that the cocoa-growing spaces continue to shrink across the major producing states.Average cocoa production in the country declined from 420,000 tonnes in the 60s to 170,000 tonnes in 1999, the Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) of the United Nations revealed. Production rose to 399,200 tonnes between 2000 and 2010 but declined to 302,066 tonnes in 2015 and to 298,029 tonnes in 2016. Nigeria dropped to fourth place in the global ranking of cocoa producers within this period.In 2017 and 2018, Nigeria’s production rose to an average 0f 333,000 tonnes and 348,448 tonnes in 2019 but fell slightly again to 340,163 in 2020. Nigeria lags behind Ghana and Cote d’Ivoire, its West African neighbours that respectively produce 1.2 million and two million tonnes annually.Nigeria’s cocoa production within the last decade suffer from twin problems – weather fluctuation and black podsFarmers say farming areas are shrinking fast due to urbanisation. They also cited extreme weather events, lack of access to soft loans, viable planting materials and other necessary inputs as their major drawbacks.Mrs Friday and other farmers in Cross River, Ondo and Ekiti states said the general effects of climate change such as irregular rainfall patterns, delayed onset of rainfall, high temperature, drought and the obvious variations in the sunshine period are affecting the production of the cocoa. Due to the fluctuating weather patterns, the farmers said cocoa is being exposed to intense pest attacks, diseases – especially black pods, uneven ripening of pods, reduced weight and contamination of beans, which is reducing the quality of Nigerian cocoa and its value in the international market.“We were shocked by the degree of rain that came last year,” Mr Bassey said. “We had serious issues maintaining our cocoa. We sprayed against black pod diseases but we still have issues with the pods.”The farmer explained that cocoa pods usually turn black under excessive rainfall.“We were told the fungi affecting the cocoa works with cold weather. So, we try to prevent excessive shade in our farms by pruning the branches for sunlight to penetrate,” Mr Bassey said.Black pod is a disease caused in cocoa by a fungus called Phytophthora palmivora. The disease infects pods, flower cushions, young vegetative shoots, stems and roots of cocoa trees.
The appearance of sun rays in the partly cloudy sky on Monday morning in early July excited Dorathy Friday, a cocoa farmer in Ikom, Cross River State. She had feared that the relentless rainfall would spoil her freshly harvested cocoa beans.
With a long wooden spatula, the farmer spread the fermented cocoa beans on a large tarpaulin spread on the ground in her compound. Her aim was to ensure that the beans were evenly exposed to the rising sun.
On that day, the surrounding air was filled with the smell of cocoa.
“The heavy rainfall is affecting the cocoa,” Mrs Friday laments.
It was the first time in almost a month that the town was experiencing warm weather. But she knew that the beans only needed a few hours of sun and warm air before she bagged them for sale.
“If the rain beats the cocoa, it will not dry well and it will have mould,” Mrs Friday said.
The activity of sun-drying cocoa beans that Monday morning was a common sight across Okondi Ikom.
Largely subsistence farmers, the people grow cocoa mostly, but also vegetables, maize and cassava in the surrounding farms.
Ikom is one of the local government areas famous for cocoa plantations. The town lies a few kilometres from the Cameroon border. The Central African country is another major cocoa producer, contributing about 70 per cent of the world’s cocoa beans alongside Cote d’Ivoire, Ghana and Nigeria. Proximity to Cameroon offers trade opportunities to Ikom and has inspired its young dwellers to embrace cocoa farming, instead of joining the rush to the cities to look for white-collar jobs.
However, production has been declining in this community as in other cocoa-producing areas across Nigeria. This has been blamed on climate change, increasing population with its attendant urbanisation, and the absence of regulatory control in the cocoa value chain in the country.
Data from Nigeria’s Meteorological Agency (NiMet) shows that the duration and intensity of rainfall have increased, causing flooding in many parts of Nigeria as witnessed last year between August and October.
Findings from a tour of cocoa farming communities in the major cocoa-producing states of Nigeria show that unpredictable weather conditions are contributing to the decline in the production of cocoa, like other major cash crops in the country.
Poor agronomic practices, market structure, lack of quality farm inputs and reliable farm data are some of the other factors. The situation is taking a huge toll on farmers’ productivity and livelihoods as most of them remain poor despite the huge wealth being made in the cocoa value chain globally. Cocoa bean is the major raw material for the $100 billion global chocolate and cocoa confectionery industry.
In Nigeria, farmers look at the past for the glory days of the cocoa industry.
“We cannot compare our production in the last 10 years to when our parents were in charge due to the degrees of rainfall we are currently experiencing,” Agbo Bassey, a cocoa farmer in Ikom, says.
He said, they expected a bountiful harvest in the community last year but the rain came unexpectedly and destroyed much of the crops.
“We had a large level of black pod infection due to the rainfall,” the farmer said. But they fear for the same experience this year. “What we have been seeing in the past three weeks has been constant rainfall on a daily basis.”
Mgbe Aya, another cocoa farmer in Ikom, said he now produces less than when he began farming 20 years ago. However, his biggest concern has been the depletion of soil fertility in his farm.
“I inherited my farm from my father. The trees are now old and the soil is no longer fertile like before,” he said.
Nigeria’s shrinking cocoa production
In the 1950s and 60s, cocoa was a major agricultural export commodity in Nigeria, and a top foreign exchange earner for the country.
Before it was displaced by crude oil (discovered in commercial quantities in the 1970s), agriculture was the mainstay of Nigeria’s economy. The country was the second-largest producer of cocoa globally. From 1960 to 1969, the agriculture sector accounted for an average of 57 per cent of Nigeria’s Gross Domestic Product (GDP) and generated about 64.5 per cent of export earnings in the country.
During this period, the government of the Western region of Nigeria used proceeds from cocoa exports to build major edifices like the 26-storey Cocoa House, the first television station in Sub-Saharan Africa – the Western Nigeria Television (WNTV) – and the University of Ife, now Obafemi Awolowo University.
However, from 1970 to the late 2000s, the sector’s contribution to GDP and export earnings steadily declined, as Nigeria’s focus shifted to fossil fuel exploration.
Nigeria’s rapidly increasing population and urbanisation also means that the cocoa-growing spaces continue to shrink across the major producing states.
Average cocoa production in the country declined from 420,000 tonnes in the 60s to 170,000 tonnes in 1999, the Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) of the United Nations revealed. Production rose to 399,200 tonnes between 2000 and 2010 but declined to 302,066 tonnes in 2015 and to 298,029 tonnes in 2016. Nigeria dropped to fourth place in the global ranking of cocoa producers within this period.
In 2017 and 2018, Nigeria’s production rose to an average 0f 333,000 tonnes and 348,448 tonnes in 2019 but fell slightly again to 340,163 in 2020. Nigeria lags behind Ghana and Cote d’Ivoire, its West African neighbours that respectively produce 1.2 million and two million tonnes annually.
Nigeria’s cocoa production within the last decade suffer from twin problems – weather fluctuation and black pods
Farmers say farming areas are shrinking fast due to urbanisation. They also cited extreme weather events, lack of access to soft loans, viable planting materials and other necessary inputs as their major drawbacks.
Mrs Friday and other farmers in Cross River, Ondo and Ekiti states said the general effects of climate change such as irregular rainfall patterns, delayed onset of rainfall, high temperature, drought and the obvious variations in the sunshine period are affecting the production of the cocoa. Due to the fluctuating weather patterns, the farmers said cocoa is being exposed to intense pest attacks, diseases – especially black pods, uneven ripening of pods, reduced weight and contamination of beans, which is reducing the quality of Nigerian cocoa and its value in the international market.
“We were shocked by the degree of rain that came last year,” Mr Bassey said. “We had serious issues maintaining our cocoa. We sprayed against black pod diseases but we still have issues with the pods.”
The farmer explained that cocoa pods usually turn black under excessive rainfall.
“We were told the fungi affecting the cocoa works with cold weather. So, we try to prevent excessive shade in our farms by pruning the branches for sunlight to penetrate,” Mr Bassey said.
Black pod is a disease caused in cocoa by a fungus called Phytophthora palmivora. The disease infects pods, flower cushions, young vegetative shoots, stems and roots of cocoa trees.