Heavy rains across most of Ivory Coast’s cocoa-growing regions could affect the country’s main cocoa yield for the year, farmers say.
Last week, farmers experienced above-average rains that are likely to cause disease and damage to pods and beans.
Ivory Coast entered the October-to-March main crop season with heavy rain in some areas arousing fear in famers on Monday.
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The world’s leading cocoa producer is in the midst of heavy rainy season that runs from April to mid-November.
Many farmers are afraid the main crop harvests that had started and likely to pick up going into next month will be affected by the rain.
Reports say the rain is making it difficult for farmers to properly dry cocoa beans.
Buyers are taking advantage of the heavy rains and offering around 750 CFA francs ($1.15) per kilogram of cocoa beans instead of 850 CFA francs ($1.30) per kilogramme as current market price, farmers lamented.
Most were reluctant to sell right away as they expect the government to announce a higher market price in October.
Farmers in Soubre and Man of the western region, and Divo in the south, farmers fear heavy rain and high soil moisture could trigger black pod disease.
“We do not need this amount of water now. It can bring black pod disease,” Alfred Koua, farmer near Soubre said.
Rainfall in Soubre last week measured 276.4 millimeters more than 258.7 mm above the five-year average.
Despite fears in some regions, farmers in the southern region of Agboville and in the eastern region of Abengourou said conditions were good despite above-average rainfall.
Similar observations were made in the central regions of Daloa, Bongouanou and Yamoussoukro, where farmers said they expected abundant harvests from October to January.
Average weekly temperatures in Ivory Coast cocoa growing areas ranged between 23.7 and 25.7 degrees Celsius.
