Entry: Bill Guyton, World Cocoa Foundation

In 1986, a consortium of chocolate manufacturing companies and The Pennsylvania State University (PSU) established the Penn State Endowed Program to support improvements in cocoa production through research on Theobroma cacao, the chocolate tree. This program operates at PSU with revenues from an endowment, funded by World Cocoa Foundation member companies. Additional contributions are also made by PSU, and the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) and other sources.

Over the past decade alone, the program has supported eight Ph.D. graduates and nearly 30 undergraduates. Graduates have gone on to work in government, academics and the private sector. Additionally, the program has welcomed six visiting scientists from cocoa-producing countries over the last four years.

The goals of the Penn State Endowment Program are:

- To stabilize and regionally diversify cocoa production
- To promote increased cocoa production proportional to demand
- To improve economic status of cacao farmers and producing countries
- To protect rainforest habitat and associated species through promotion of sustainable and profitable cacao
production systems

This is accomplished through the identification of elite cacao germplasm, propagation systems and technology transfer to cocoa farmers. The program is under the excellent leadership of Dr. Mark Guiltinan. For more information on the program, please visit: http://guiltinanlab.cas.psu.edu/Research/Cocoa/cocoa.htm.


Penn State Endowment Program faculty and students

I have the opportunity to visit Penn State University each fall, for an annual review of the program. It is encouraging to learn about the accomplishments of the program and the collaborations the PSU team has formed with researchers in cocoa-producing countries. Some of these achievements include the development of vegetative propagation methods that can be used in combination to achieve a large and rapid multiplication of cacao plants from single elite trees including in vitro tissue culture. The PSU program is also helping to identify ways of reducing disease losses on cocoa farms, as highlighted in one of our past blogs by PSU doctoral graduate, Rachel Melnick.

The World Cocoa Foundation is pleased to support the PSU cocoa research endowment with our member companies and thank Dr. Mark Guiltinan, Siela Maximova, the faculty and students who have made the program a success.

Permalink | Posted On March 10, 2010 Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Entry: Robert Peck, World Cocoa Foundation

Last week I had the opportunity to visit the department of Huila in Colombia with Bernardo Saenz (Executive Director of Colombia’s National Cocoa Council), Juan Carlos Arroyave and Alberto Agudelo (from the World Cocoa Foundation’s member company Casa Luker) and Ricardo Mejia (from the World Cocoa Foundation’s member company Compañía Nacional de Chocolates). The World Cocoa Foundation and our two member companies are funding training activities through the National Cocoa Council in this region. I was warned to be prepared to travel to a valley which is suffering from a severe drought and where average temperatures easily surpass 110 F (43 C). Huila, located in the south-west of the country, has traditionally been known for its role as a rice growing region (using flood irrigation), its oil exploration fields, and more recently for aquaculture initiatives and the production of specialty coffees in the higher altitudes of the Andean mountain range. Cocoa has played an important role on a local scale, but poor fermentation practices and the presence of monilia (frosty pod rot) have severely affected yields and farm incomes.

Photo: Omar holds a cocoa pod infected with monilia (left) and a healthy pod (right).

I would like to share with you the story of a farmer I met nearby the municipality of Rivera. Omar is 73 years old and for the past 9 years has lived with his wife on a 4-hectare (9.8-acre) farm. When he purchased the farm, it was generating almost no income and the cocoa trees had been neglected, reaching over 15 feet in height and producing only a few pods per year. Omar has tried growing other crops (tobacco and passion fruit), but low prices and the lack of market opportunities made these not a sustainable option. Omar began receiving technical assistance from Casa Luker two years ago, and his farm has been selected as a demonstration site for training that the World Cocoa Foundation is co-funding on better post-harvest practices. Reducing the crop height, continual pruning, removal of infected pods, grafting and irrigation are some of the practices that he has implemented. What were the results?

In 2006-2007, he produced 330 Kg/ha resulting in an estimated net profit of 646,500 Colombian pesos. In the following two years, Omar’s cocoa production continued to increase; in 2007-2008, he produced 557 Kg/ha resulting in an estimated net profit of 913,480 Colombian pesos, and in 2008-2009 he produced 1,400 Kg/ha leading to an estimated net profit of 3,872,000 Colombian pesos.

Photo: A grafted seedling on Omar’s farm.

Omar is definitely a success story. Due to the amount of work he needs to invest into his farm, he has had to hire neighbors to help him with the agricultural practices that he has adopted. He is fortunate to have enough supply of water on his farm, which in the last year had been critical for his crops to thrive despite the dry season. The incidence of monilia in his crop is nowadays less than 5%, producing a positive effect on his bottom line. I am hopeful that next time I visit Omar, he will have finished grafting his unproductive cocoa trees, his timber trees will be a few feet higher and hopefully his neighbors have also made similar progress because Omar’s success is evident.

Permalink | Posted On March 1, 2010 Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Entry: Bill Guyton and Robert Peck, World Cocoa Foundation

Medellín, Colombia is situated in a valley about 45 minutes from the airport. This is the headquarters for World Cocoa Foundation member Compañía Nacional de Chocolates (CNCH) who manufactures chocolate products from bean to bar. We had time to tour the CNCH plant and learn more about their sourcing practices and outreach to cocoa farmers. Below is a photo taken from the entrance of the CNCH factory.

Robert Peck and Bill Guyton join Juan Fernando Valenzuela and colleague Ricardo for a tour of the CNCH facilities.

Our thanks to Sol Beatríz Arango, Enrique Escobar and Juan Fernando Valenzuela of CNCH for hosting us in Medellín.

As we leave Colombia, we are encouraged by what we have seen. An estimated 125,000 hectares of cocoa is currently under cultivation, grown by nearly 40,000 smallholder farmers. Although production is still around 38,000 metric tons, new planting areas will come into production over the coming years. It is estimated that by 2014, Colombia will become a net exporter of cocoa.

The efforts of both public and private sector cocoa initiatives have proven successful. The U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) and several other development agencies have supported important programs over the past few years.

We at the World Cocoa Foundation look forward to continued collaboration with our member companies in Colombia, as well as the Cocoa National Council, a public-private sector organization, based in Bogota.

Permalink | Posted On February 19, 2010 Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Entry: Bill Guyton and Robert Peck, World Cocoa Foundation

Manizales is a beautiful part of Colombia, best known for its coffee production. As you can see in the photo below, the rolling hillsides are covered with coffee trees which are the economic backbone for this region of Colombia.

Manizales, land of coffee

Although cocoa is not typically grown in Manizales, Robert and I are here to meet with World Cocoa Foundation member Casa Luker who support cocoa and agoforestry research at their farm less than an hour outside the city.

We are joined by Casa Luker representatives, Juan Carlos Arroyave and Alberto Agudelo for the journey. At the farm, we are introduced to Farm Manager Pedro Castellanos who brings us on a tour of the cocoa nurseries and training facilities.

Farm Manager Pedro Castellanos shows us grafted cocoa seedling.

The Casa Luker research facility has dormitories and classrooms dedicated to farmer training. Three-day training courses include topics on global marketing of cocoa, quality, planting and harvesting techniques, disease and pest management, and agroforestry.

Farmers can purchase grafted cocoa seedlings at the research facility. Most of the planting materials are Trinitario varieties, although CCN-51 is also available.

The greatest challenge to cocoa farmers in Colombia is containing diseases such as Frosty Pod Rot (monilia). During the training at Casa Luker farm, participants learn about early detection of the disease and how to contain the spread. Certain varieties of cocoa are more resistant or tolerant to the disease.

After touring the training facilities, we walked through some of the agroforestry trials. Here the researchers are determining how best to plant cocoa with other trees such as bananas, plantains, papaya, passion fruit, coffee and timber species. Most of the spacing was roughly 3 x 3 meters for the fruit trees, while timber was intercropped at 4 x 16 meters.

From a smallholder farmer perspective, this type of system makes sense, since bananas can be harvested in the first couple of years, while cocoa matures and is ready to harvest starting in 4-5 years. Timber species take longer to mature, of course.

Cocoa grows well with many different types of tree species, including papaya.

We also saw some intensive cocoa plots with trees kept at 3-4 meters high which were producing well and without disease problems.

After completing the tour at the research farm, Robert and I were invited to visit the surrounding coffee farms and to see a local coffee processing facility.

We greatly appreciate the time spent with our colleagues at Casa Luker.

Permalink | Posted On February 18, 2010 Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

Entry: Bill Guyton and Robert Peck, World Cocoa Foundation

When most people think of cocoa in Latin America, countries such as Ecuador, Dominican Republic, and Brazil come to mind. Several other countries in the region, however, are also demonstrating their desire to increase production and to promote and market cocoa in the region where it first originated.

Over the past few days, Robert and I have visited Peru and Colombia. Although Robert travels here frequently, it has been over two years since my last visit. There are some very positive developments and challenges that we wanted to share with you.

PERU CROP SIZE AND OUTLOOK
This year, cocoa production in Peru has been handicapped by the negative weather effects of El Niño. Nevertheless, over 60,000 hectares are now under cultivation and the prospects for next year's crop look more promising.

PERU COCOA FARMING AND CHALLENGES
Similar to West Africa, cocoa farming is grown on small farms with typically less than 10 acres in size. Cocoa is grown in association with other tree crops and food crops, providing a good income for people living in rural areas. Frosty pod rot (monilia), a fungal disease, is a common problem which can destroy up to 40 percent of the crop if not treated or contained.

COCOA PROGRAMS IN PERU
We were impressed by the on-going efforts of the Ministry of Agriculture, development agencies, and private initiatives to help develop the cocoa value chain in Peru. In particular, we would like to recognize the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) and the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) for playing an important role in these efforts. In many areas, cocoa can be an alternative to elicit crop production.

In previous years, the World Cocoa Foundation co-funded a regional coordination program with USAID and Organization of American States (OAS) called "ACCESO”. The ACCESO Program harmonized the training curriculum for farmers and exchanged best practices among cocoa projects.

Looking forward, we see great potential in Peru to increase cocoa productivity through new plantings and rehabilitation of existing trees. We wish to thank our member companies Romero Trading SA and Nacional de Chocolates-Peru for hosting us during our stay in Lima and providing their insights.

Our update on Colombia will follow.

Permalink | Posted On February 17, 2010 Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)