Ivory Coast's main cocoa harvest will sustain both volumes and quality this year, helping ease supply concerns, and favourable weather so far points to a healthy mid crop, farmers and analysts said on Friday. Weekly arrivals at ports in the No 1 grower are tailing off as the October-March main crop comes to an end but they remain well above last year's levels and some exporters think March volumes could nearly double last year's 60,000 tonnes.
Poor weather and disease accentuated longer-term problems linked to ageing cocoa trees, leading to a poor main crop so far. Arrivals for the 2008/09 season reached 774,407 tonnes by February 15, down from 963,321 tonnes in the same period a year ago, according to data from exporters. This has helped cocoa futures buck the trend of the commodities slump and, boosted by a weak pound sterling, cocoa traded in London broke 24-year high last month.
Prices have eased of late and May New York cocoa contracts slipped $70 to 2,500 per tonne on Friday morning. "There are lots of big pods on the trees that we will keep cutting until the end of March. The exporters will have lots of beans to collect," said farmer Innocent Zamble, whose farm is near Meagui, 85 km (53 miles) north of San Pedro.
Similar reports came from the western regions of Soubre, Bouafle and Duekoue and from Aboisso to the south, where plenty of large pods will be harvested in coming weeks, farmers said. "One thing is sure, there will be cocoa and the beans will be large through March because of the good rain. There won't be a gap like there was last year," said a purchases manager working for a European exporter.
"This will help us get closer to our target in terms of volumes because I think about 100,000 tonnes could come out of the bush in March," the manager added. The country's main growing areas have reported abundant rain in recent weeks, which farmers said will lead to sustained volumes that are of better quality than last year.
"There won't be a gap in the harvest before the mid crop and the rains that keep falling will ensure that the beans are large," said farmer Koffi Kouame, whose farm is near Soubre, the heart of the cocoa belt.
HEALTHY DEVELOPMENT As well as supporting a strong finish the main crop, the rain has led to healthy development of the small pods on the trees ahead of the April-September mid crop. Another purchases manager of a European exporter said it was too early for a precise forecast for the mid crop but if the current weather patterns continued, the outlook was positive.
"The weather conditions are good at the moment. It is still early ... and things could change with the weather. But if the trend of rains continues until the end of April, we could have at least 250,000 tonnes of beans for the mid crop," he said.
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