Cocoa

The cocoa bean which is called the cacao bean and is the dried and fully fermented seed of Theobroma cacao, is very famous in making chocolates and butter.

Millions of people consume cocoa based products around the world and cocoa is grown and produced in Ivory Coast, Ghana, Nigeria, Cameroon, Indonesia, Nigeria, Cameroon, Brazil and Ecuador.

Nearly 70 percent of the world’s cocoa beans are obtained from West Africa. The Ivory Coast and Ghana are the two largest producers of cocoa and they are directly accountable for over 50 percent of the worlds Cocoa cultivated land.

Ivory Coast produced about 2 million metric million tons of cocoa in 2017/2018 and Ghana produced about 950,000 metric tons.

The global cocoa and chocolate market is valued at US$ 49.4 billion in 2018 and USA consumes the most cocoa-based products, ahead of Germany and France and their annual consumption is about 46,400 metric tons.

Cocoa trees would take 3 to 5 years to yield a crop and cocoa trees could be fruitful for about 25 years. Hybrid cocoa varieties providing crops much earlier. Many food products are flavored and colored using Cocoa

The by-products of cocoa are liquor, chocolate, butter, powder, cocoa husk, cocoa pulp, discarded cocoa pods, Jam and Jelly, soap, wax, mineral oil, body lotion and cream etc.