Ivory Coast's 2007/2008 cocoa harvest, which has just got under way, is likely to be around 1.25 million tonnes compared with an estimated 1.3 million for the 2006/2007 season, the economy minister said on Wednesday.
While Economy and Finance Minister Charles Koffi Diby offered no reason for the lower crop forecast, a senior industry official said black pod fungal disease would cut back yields in the world's No 1 cocoa grower.
"According to the information given to me by the Agriculture Minister, we should have 1.25 million tonnes instead of the 1.3 million of this (2006/2007) season," Diby told Reuters in an interview.
"We've made our forecasts in relation to that," he added. Earlier, the head of the Coffee and Cocoa Bourse (BCC) marketing body issued a warning about the impact of black pod fungal disease on the new harvest. "In 2007/2008, Ivory Coast cannot produce the maximum yields. Disease is a very disturbing matter," BCC chairman Lucien Tape Do told Reuters at an industry conference he was attending in Ghana.
The BCC has said it expects Ivorian output for the October-March main crop - the principal segment of the overall cocoa season - to reach up to 950,000 tonnes.
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