The Point of View<\/strong><\/em>\u00a0on Monday, February 9.<\/p>\nDr. Opoku argued that the present situation would have been far worse if not for decisions taken by the previous administration to trade some cocoa forward, a move he believes helped cushion the sector against current shocks.<\/p>\n
\u201cIn fact, they are even lucky that the previous administration traded some cocoa forward. Otherwise, the situation would have been worse than what we are seeing today,\u201d he stated.<\/p>\n
He further placed responsibility for the financial and operational challenges facing COCOBOD squarely on the current administration, pointing particularly to exchange rate pressures.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou can blame the administration. You can put the challenges at the doorstep of the current administration. The exchange rates we are seeing, who caused them?\u201d he questioned.<\/p>\n
Dr. Opoku noted that cocoa farmers were paid between January and October under prevailing exchange rates determined by the current government, making it difficult to shift blame elsewhere.<\/p>\n
\u201cIn any case, when they were paying the cocoa farmer from January through February, March, up to October, what was the exchange rate? They cannot put the blame anywhere else apart from the current administration,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n
Addressing concerns surrounding cocoa contract rollovers, Dr. Opoku dismissed claims that the practice is unusual, stressing that it is standard across the global cocoa industry. He explained that production projections are often affected by factors beyond control, including weather conditions, bushfires, and smuggling.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou do your projections. If you anticipate producing a certain quantity and, for some reason, you are unable to meet that target, you roll over the contracts at the prevailing price. It happens all the time,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
He recalled that when the Nana Addo-led government took office in 2017, it inherited cocoa contract rollovers amounting to about 190,208 tonnes, without attracting public controversy. He also cited C\u00f4te d\u2019Ivoire\u2019s rollover of about 500,000 metric tonnes of cocoa in 2024 as further evidence that the practice is not unusual.<\/p>\n
\u201cContract rollovers are standard industry practice. It happens all the time,\u201d Dr. Opoku emphasized.<\/p>\n
He warned that even current production projections could still be disrupted by unforeseen events, which would again necessitate contract rollovers.<\/p>\n
\u201cIf you project 650,000 tonnes and something happens and you are unable to produce that, you roll over at the prevailing price,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
Dr. Opoku\u2019s comments come amid intense public debate over COCOBOD\u2019s inability to meet some cocoa supply contracts and the broader implications for farmers, financing, and the sustainability of Ghana\u2019s cocoa sector.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Dr. Isaac Opoku, Member of Parliament for Offinso and Ranking Member on Parliament\u2019s Food, Agriculture and Cocoa Affairs Committee, has called on the management of the Ghana Cocoa Board (COCOBOD) to be transparent with cocoa farmers and the general public over the challenges confronting the cocoa sector. According to him, COCOBOD must clearly explain the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":123457,"featured_media":15538,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[3788,3525,41,18],"tags":[1508,4905,4906],"class_list":["post-15537","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-agriculture","category-economy","category-general-news","category-politics","tag-cocobod","tag-dr-isaac-opoku","tag-offinso-south"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.fishfmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15537","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.fishfmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.fishfmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.fishfmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/123457"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.fishfmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=15537"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.fishfmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15537\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":15539,"href":"https:\/\/www.fishfmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15537\/revisions\/15539"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.fishfmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/15538"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.fishfmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=15537"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.fishfmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=15537"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.fishfmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=15537"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}