Sangam: A Confluence of Knowledge Streams

Ghana’s Cocoa Farmers Need to Change Gear: What Policymakers Need to Know, and What They Might Do

Show simple item record

dc.creator Amanor, Kojo
dc.creator Yaro, Joseph
dc.creator Teye, Joseph
dc.creator Wiggins, Steve
dc.date 2022-03-01T16:15:34Z
dc.date 2022-03-01T16:15:34Z
dc.date 2022-03-01
dc.date.accessioned 2022-05-26T08:53:24Z
dc.date.available 2022-05-26T08:53:24Z
dc.identifier Amanor, K.; Yaro, J.; Teye, J. and Wiggins, S. (2022) Ghana’s Cocoa Farmers Need to Change Gear: What Policymakers Need to Know, and What They Might Do. APRA Brief 30. Brighton: Future Agricultures Consortium, DOI: 10.19088/APRA.2022.008
dc.identifier 978-1-78118-949-8
dc.identifier https://opendocs.ids.ac.uk/opendocs/handle/20.500.12413/17199
dc.identifier Rural Futures
dc.identifier 10.19088/APRA.2022.008
dc.identifier.uri http://localhost:8080/xmlui/handle/CUHPOERS/198992
dc.description Cocoa farmers in Ghana face increasing challenges. In the past, many of them could make a living from cocoa thanks to the advantages – ‘forest rents’ – that initially apply when forest is cleared to create cocoa farms: fertile soils, few pests and diseases. With time, however, weeds invade, pests and diseases build up, and trees age. To maintain production requires more labour, more inputs and more skill. In the past, farmers would often abandon older groves and seek new forest to clear. As they did so, the frontier for cocoa farming moved westwards across Ghana to the remaining high forest. But by 2000 or so, no new forest was available. Farmers now have to manage aging stands of trees, clear weeds and parasites, and combat pests, fungi and diseases. In Suhum District in the east and in Juaboso District in the far west of Ghana, we talked to farmers. They understood the challenges they faced, and knew how to deal with some of them. But many were not farming their cocoa as well as they could, losing yields and income as a result. This brief provides a basis for policymakers to move forward in responding to the current challenges facing cocoa farmers.
dc.language en
dc.publisher APRA, Future Agricultures Consortium
dc.rights http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/
dc.rights APRA, Future Agricultures Consortium
dc.subject Agriculture
dc.subject Development Policy
dc.subject Environment
dc.subject Rural Development
dc.title Ghana’s Cocoa Farmers Need to Change Gear: What Policymakers Need to Know, and What They Might Do
dc.type Series paper (non-IDS)
dc.coverage Ghana


Files in this item

Files Size Format View
APRA_Policy_Bri ... now_What_They_Might_Do.pdf 2.970Mb application/pdf View/Open

This item appears in the following Collection(s)

Show simple item record

Search DSpace


Advanced Search

Browse