Joseph Boahen Aidoo (photo) is working hard to allay fears among Ghanaian farmers that China’s (still very small) emergence as a cocoa exporter is not a threat to their livelihoods.
The CEO of the Ghanaian Cocoa Board, a group that represents the interests of the $2 billion a year industry that employs 800,000 people, told reporters late last week that the recent 500 kilogram shipment of cocoa beans from the southern Chinese island of Hainan is not large enough to present a threat to the world’s largest exporters in West Africa.