by Pius Lukong
Cameroon plans to boost cocoa production to as much as 300,000 metric tons a year by 2015, up from about 219,000 tons, according to ...a government official.
Cameroon, the world’s fifth-biggest producer of the crop after Ivory Coast, Ghana, Indonesia and Nigeria, plans to boost output by training farmers to maintain and clean farms to ensure parasites and old pods, which can cause disease, are removed
Improved farming conditions will increase yields from 300 to 500 kilograms (661 to 1,102 pounds) a hectare (2.47 acres) to 800 to 2,000 kilograms. Cocoa farms in the Central African nation at present cover 450,000 hectares of land produced by 600,000 farmers, the official said.
Cameroon has produced 219,000 tons of cocoa this year since the season started in August, according to the Cocoa and Coffee Board. The country’s output was 198,000 tons in 2009-10.
full article at Businessweek
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