Entry: Bill Guyton, World Cocoa Foundation and TJ Ryan, ACDI/VOCA

We are very sorry to learn that James Mangan, who developed the ACDI/VOCA farmer field school methodology and curriculum in Indonesia, Vietnam and Ecuador, has passed away. For those familiar with the SUCCESS Alliance program in Southeast Asia, you would have known the great influence and impact James was able to make. In the field of curriculum development and farmer field school methodology, James was simply without peer. He not only taught how to teach but also how to value every single participant in our projects as well as many other valuable lessons. He will be sorely missed.

Photo: James Mangan at a Farmer Field School in Ecuador

James was a self trained entomologist and a voracious reader who could hold forth on a wide range of subjects. He instilled discipline in those he trained, commitment to a highly participatory methodology and indirectly raised the self-esteem of tens of thousands of farmers who didn't think they could conduct research or implement the improved crop husbandry techniques taught in the farmer field schools but were firm believers by the second or third session of the FFS. If ACDI/VOCA implements the farmer field school methodology well, we owe that to James without any doubt. Fortunately James was an excellent teacher with many devoted students and so his impact will continue on in cocoa groves (and other crops) around the world.

He really was an extraordinary person and we will miss him.

Other tributes from those in the cocoa world:

From BK Matlick:
I too am saddened by this news of the loss of James!! Like most of us who are FFS advocates I owe my basic understanding of the methodology to James. His methodology and technical expertise in the many crops that FFS have been used as a training method has improved the quality of life of millions of small farm families. Those of us who have studied under James and have transferred his FFS training exercises to many countries and millions of farmers will remember him and always.

Please forward to his widow my personal thanks for her sharing James with us over the past eight years!! BK Matlick

From Uriel Buitrago in Ecuador:
Of course this is really terrible news. James was the "one and only" Mentor of all our 21,710 smallholder farmers' successful FFS training. We really admired him for all his wisdom, not just in FFS but also in a broad number of subjects including entomology , to which he was really devoted. James set the basis of our projects' success, there is absolutetly no question about it. Without him I simply don't knw how we would have done.

From Ross Jaax:
You will be amazed to know that in January this year, James climbed to the summit of Mt. Kilimanjaro! He was 64, and unbeknownst to him, he was already terminally ill with cancer. May we all live life to the fullest and remain forever curious as James did.

James was never more happy than we was working with cocoa farmers in the field. He enjoyed that crop a lot. And he especially enjoyed his time in Ecuador working alongside you of the partners. He would have liked to return there again.

Entry: Bill Guyton

This week, The Payson Center at Tulane University issued a report on child labor conditions in the cocoa growing sector of West Africa. The report is part of an ongoing, growing effort to bring research and greater understanding to the complex web of labor issues affecting cocoa farms.

The Tulane report highlights, among several findings, issues associated with children participating in unsafe farming tasks. In particular, application of pesticide is mentioned. This is a priority area for the World Cocoa Foundation, and has been for some time.

In West Africa, WCF and its partners support the Sustainable Tree Crops Program (STCP)which uses particpatory training on cocoa farms to help improve the incomes and farming practices of family farmers. Part of the "farmer field schools" include modules on how to identify and address hazardous tasks for both adults and children. These programs are showing positive results, as explained by graduates of the farmer field schools. Over the next few years, this program will reach over 150,000 farmers and their families. We are still learning from the programs and interactions with farmers to identify and promote the best farm safety practices.

In addition to STCP, World Cocoa Foundation and partners are also supporting a youth livelihoods program in Ghana and Cote d'Ivoire called "ECHOES". This program is providing formal and non formal educational opportunities to thousands of young people in the cocoa growing regions. As with farm safety, access to education is a critical component to improving the lives of children and adults in the cocoa sector.

The Tulane report also mentions that anti-trafficking measures need to be a priority in the overall effort. This is definately important and host governments, several non-government organizations (including the International Cocoa Initiative) and others are taking actions on this important topic.

World Cooca Foundation, our member companies and partners realize that in order to successfully improve the cocoa sector, active participation of multiple partners: governments, the chocolate and cocoa industry, non-government organizations --- and most importantly -- cocoa growing communities is required.

Entry: Bill Guyton

Greetings from Hamburg where we just completed the 14th World Cocoa Foundation Partnership Meeting. Over 150 people attended for the two day conference which covered a variety of topics from our new challenge grant program, commodity life cycles, and regional research collaboration. Our keynote speaker, Mr. Wolfgang Schmitt of GTZ, explained how the German government is working through public-private partnerships to support sustainable agricultural development in the developing world. We heard later from Ambassador Flemming Pederson/Danish Foreign Ministry, Ms. Petra Hippmann/BMZ, Carsten Schmitz-Hoffmann/GTZ and Richard Rogers/Gates Foundation, of how governments and private foundations are working in partnership to improve the lives of communities in the developing world.

One of the highlights of the meeting was the announcement of World Cocoa Foundation "Challenge Grants" which will foster innovations at the farm level in West Africa, Latin America and Southeast Asia. A description of the eight awards is highlighted here.

World Cocoa Foundation also discussed our "Sustainability in Action" outline, to better describe how we better articulate the priorities and learnings from economic, social and environmental aspects of the programs we support.

We appreciate all who were able to join us in the beautiful city of Hamburg, and to the distinguished speakers who participated and shared their knowledge with us.

Entry: Bill Guyton, World Cocoa Foundation

Last week, I was in Liberia visiting our in-country partners; the Sustainable Tree Crops Program (STCP), CARI, ACDI/VOCA, Socodevi and others. I was accompanied by four colleagues from the chocolate and cocoa industry. The objectives of our trip were to assess the challenges and opportunities for sustainable cocoa farming; attend the STCP Regional Executive Committee Meeting in Monrovia; and meet with key public and private stakeholders in the agricultural sector.

On our first day in Liberia, we took a three hour drive from Monrovia to visit the Central Agricultural Research Institute (CARI) in Gbarnga. Reseachers there are working with partners to build capacity for the production of hand pollinated cocoa hybrids and seed gardens. Improved planting material is vital, in order to ensure that cocoa farmers are able to achieve their productivity and farm level incomes.

Afterwards, we drove a few kilometers past the CARI Reseach Center to attend an STCP "farmer field school" (FFS) where local facilitators were being trained in Gbaota and Naii. I took some photographs of the training session which focused on farm-level fermentation that day. Fermenting cocoa, using local materials, adds value to the crop and improves its quality.

Cocoa farmers shared with us some of their major obstacles after the training session. Among the most common challenges were the lack of good planting material and the need for improved, more transparent marketing systems. We observed that many of the trees on farms are aging, and low yielding.

It is clear that developing a sustainable cocoa sector will take time and will need the active engagement of all stakeholders; Liberian government, development organizations, the private sector and researchers. Through the Sustainable Tree Crops Program, we at the World Cocoa Foundation are pleased to work in partnership with others, to help make this happen.

My personal thanks to the Liberian government representatives, our local partners and the cocoa farmers we met with during the trip.

Entry: Bill Guyton

I wanted to share with you a recent article, published in the Guardian News on October 12. World Cocoa Foundation is pleased to support the Sutainable Tree Crops Program (STCP) which is referenced several times by the author. The STCP Network in Nigeria, with the leadership of Chris Okafor, is working hand-in-hand with local governments and farmer groups to help improve farm level incomes and farming efficiency.

Sunday, October 12, 2008

Cocoa Farmers In Edo Complete Field Training, Receive Certificates
By Olukayode Oyeleye

A HIGH profile graduation ceremony was held for the first batch of graduates of the cocoa farmers' field school (FFS) in Edo State on Friday. At the elaborate ceremony, held at the Cultural Centre, Benin, a total of 477 graduates were presented for the award of certificates.

Professor Oserheimen Osunbor, the state governor, who gave cash awards to some of the graduates, noted that "the Edo State government has fully embraced the farmers' field school (FFS) programme in order to improve cocoa production in the state."

According to the governor, he state has met all its financial obligations to the National Cocoa Development Committee (NCDC). He appealed, however, to the Federal Ministry of Agriculture and the NCDC to "ensure that Edo State gets its fair share of agricultural inputs for the benefit of our farmers."

"In order to guarantee high quality cocoa production that will meet international standard, the state government has set up a cocoa monitoring committee to ensure this objective," Governor Osunbor said.

He encouraged the "management of the farmers' field school programme to ensure that, in the next few years, all the major cocoa-producing communities in the state have their own farmers' field school.

Mrs. Kehinde Ajao, representing the Agriculture minister, Sayyadi Abba Ruma, read in a speech, that the farmers' field school has been adopted by the NCDC "as its main strategy of training and extending new technologies and innovations to cocoa farmers."

The farmers' field school approach, according to the minister's representative, has also been found to promote the adoption of productivity-enhancing, sustainable, environmentally friendly, socially responsible and cost-effective cocoa production practices among smallholders."

She alluded to the experiences of farmers who have already been involved in the schools as indicating "that the scheme had brought remarkable turn-around in their fortunes and welfare. Through this scheme, farmers have learnt how to handle their harvests in a better way, which resulted in improved quality of cocoa beans as well as increased yields of crops and incomes of farmers."

Friday Idahor, FFS coordinator in Edo State, told The Guardian that "each FFS has two facilitators that we refer to as teachers in conventional schools. They teach these farmers. One of them is an extension officer in the Ministry of Agriculture, and the other, assisting, is a trained cocoa farmer."

"We have undergone long and short-term training on the FFS programme," Idahor disclosed, adding that "the state government has sponsored us to a number of FFS workshops in various places (and) the success we have recorded today is attributable to the governor and his deputy."

Idahor recalled that, "before, the school was dormant. The facilitators and I were trained before 2005, but could not commence the school for obvious reasons. Government order was backed up by necessary support to carry on the operations."

He acknowledged the advantage Edo has enjoyed through the state deputy governor, who he described as the chairman of NCDC sub-committee on training, which supervises the FFS. This is an advantage we have. The present 22 schools are not enough. Our teeming cocoa farmers are yearning for the establishment of FFS in their various committees. In the next phase, we will increase the number of the schools in Edo State.

Mr Idahor emphasised that "the FFS is free and we still give our facilitators allowance to go to these schools in addition to the motorcycles given by the state government." He assured that "there is not going to be any break. It is continuous programme. Same time next year, we should be graduating another set of students."

Chief Iguagbe Stephen from Ukho community in Fugar, Etsako Central local government, who has been in cocoa farming for over 30 years, told The Guardian that, from FFS, he got the knowledge on "where to cultivate cocoa, time to plant the young ones, distance from tree to tree."

He said "we were also taught of the period to use or not to use chemicals and the type of disease that worries cocoa farms."

According to Iguagbe, who said he has up to 14 acres of cocoa farms, "it is also a good method to see that when we can comply with what we are taught by our facilitators, we won't waste money on chemicals."

Evelyn Uwmareogie, from Okopen in Ovia North local government, inherited part of her father's cocoa farm, the size of which she could not estimate. "Every year," she said, "we bought cocoa chemicals, yet the pods still turn black. No improvement. With the FFS, we were taught how to use chemicals on coca, how to ferment the cocoa beans, how to use rafts for drying."

On this year's production, she said, without using chemicals, the production has increased more than before. "We don't want to use chemicals any more." Evelyn estimated that about three cans of a particular chemical, each costing N4,500, was used annually on their farm, before their exposure to FFS. She said all that expense would not be necessary this year. She said that from what she learnt in FFS, even with salt solution, some trees having certain infection have been treated successfully, and such trees bear fruits after treatment. "That is the system we apply on our farm now, and we enjoy it."

Iguagbe added that one thing is still lacking in cocoa production in Edo; "how we can always know the price of cocoa in a season without waving up and down (fluctuation). We don't know (if) the cocoa authorities in marketing section will favour us on accurate pricing so as to avoid problems between buyers and farmers." He said "it will be good" if the government would sustain its present effort in the future. Madam Uwmareogie corroborated Iguagbe's worries, saying "what we need now is how to get the cocoa beans sold at higher prices."

Ovie Ighofose, 39, from Okokpon 1 in Ovia South West local government, started cocoa farming about four years ago. According to him, he was moved when he saw some people making money from the cocoa production business, especially. Realising that he had access to land, Ighofose decided to start and later joined the FFS. He planted his own cocoa at the time he began the business and now some have started fruiting.

"I leant so much with regards to spacing, pruning, to avoid too much shade. I already know now some of the problems I would face with regards to diseases. We have been told that those of us who graduated today might be taken through additional training again later."

He said the participants did not pay for the training which took nine months. "I am sure if I am able to implement this knowledge on the farm, it will yield better income and I will not experience the problems which those who did not have this knowledge face."

Lucky Imasuen, deputy governor, lamented that, although 14 states began the cocoa farmers' field schools, some are still grappling with the payment of their counterpart funding. He was praised as one that is committed to cocoa development, not only in Edo, but also in other cocoa-producing states.

Dr. Chris Okafor, country manager of the Sustainable Tree Crops Programmes, who has been at the forefront of the FFS, warned that the graduates of FFS in Edo should not be seen as those to be employed by the government. He said the farmers would soon be formed into cooperatives to enable them sell their produce.

Entry: Bill Guyton and Tracey Duffey

Small scale cocoa farmers in Southeast Asia face many challenges to overcome the devastating diseases and pests such as cocoa pod borer (CPB), black pod and vascular streak dieback (VSD). In some cases, such diseases and pest can completely destroy a farmer’s crop.

In an effort to help address some of these problems, World Cocoa Foundation (WCF) supported the INGENIC Asia Pacific Working Group, a regional network of Asian cocoa researchers. With funding from WCF and others, INGENIC is conducting field trials to test the best regional crosses exchanged among participating research institutes in Indonesia, India, Malaysia, Papua New Guinea, the Philippines and Vietnam. As a result, researchers are better able to evaluate planting material that exhibits superior yields and tolerance to cocoa pod borer (CPB), black pod and vascular streak dieback (VSD).

WCF’s funding support for 2008 contributed to the regional exchanges, allowing for more than 3,000 hybrid seedlings to be planted in the field. When established in the field, all of the tree seedlings are evaluated for production and resistance to local pests and diseases. Some of the planted trees are already flowering!

We would like to thank in particular, Dr. Smilja Lambert, from Mars Incorporated, for her leadership in working with the Southeast Asia cocoa research institutes. She and the other INGENIC working group members, are helping to make a significant difference in sustainable cocoa farming.

Photos:
A. The package of seed shipment from the Philippines
B. Starting germinating the seeds of the cross of BR 25 x K2.
C. Seeds germinating
D. Nursery - soil media in polybags 15 x 25cm for seed planting.

Photo: Field trial in the Philippines with Dr. Romulo Cena, the cocoa breeder from the University of Southern Mindanao with Malaysian hybrid already in soil and jorquetting.

Guest Blog Entry: Michael Wilcox, University of Tennessee

I just returned from a fruitful week in Monrovia, Liberia. While I was there, I had the pleasure of attending and presenting at the Sustainable Tree Crop Program’s Executive Committee Meeting. The meeting provided me an opportunity to hear about the opportunities that are being created all over West Africa. This had me thinking about the future and reflecting on the past…

In 1993, I arrived in Cameroon as a US Peace Corps volunteer. I was posted in the Central Province right in the heart of Cameroon’s early cocoa plantings from the dawn of the last century. Though I was tasked with assisting farmers with integrating aquaculture into their existing agricultural practices, I couldn’t help but notice that many of my potential clients were quite occupied with cocoa. At the time, the domestic market was liberalizing and currency devaluation was to many a foreboding sign of economic crisis. Though farmers were dissatisfied with farmgate prices and worried about the effects from the loss of ‘protection’ by the government, cocoa offered them an opportunity to provide income to their families and continue the legacy of their forefathers.

In 2004 as a graduate student at Purdue University, I was afforded the opportunity to study the post-liberalization effects on farmgate prices in Cameroon. The regional differences were striking. Relatively more remote farmers in the South Province were receiving significantly lower prices than their counterparts in the Center and Southwest. Overall, the farmer’s share of the world price had risen but public goods, such as extension, research, market information and infrastructure, were not being provided. Since then, the market continues to evolve and farmers in the 2007/08 season were receiving prices that they could never have imagined in 1993. This was certainly due to increases on the world market but also due to the pro-competitive effects liberalization and of famer groups that have sprung up all over the cocoa belt. These ‘common initiative groups’, some assisted by the Sustainable Tree Crops Program (STCP), have provided farmers a local institutional framework that allows them to sell cocoa and obtain inputs collectively and more efficiently. The groups also offer a means of saving cocoa-derived income, sharing production information and signaling market information to members and non-members alike.

Concurrently, Liberia was in the midst of a brutal civil war that resulted in a massive displacement of its people, destruction of its institutions, infrastructure and social fabric and a complete economic meltdown. As people returned to their ancestral homes in 2004, many in the cocoa belt found that the only thing remaining after fourteen years of civil unrest was their plot of cocoa. These smallholder plots were still producing but also drowning in secondary growth and left unfathomably tall as the trees sought sunlight from under the ever thickening canopy. With cocoa helping to demarcate some of their former landholdings, many Liberians set forth building new homes and trying to determine how to move forward. Many farmers looked to cocoa as a means of jumpstarting their household income only to find that the local market was rife with smugglers and unscrupulous buyers that were offering the world’s lowest prices.

The de facto market liberalization, brought by the conflict rather than policy, had left farmers at the mercy of agents that knew little about cocoa and were only driven by the desire to widen the farm to market price spread to their own benefit. In the face of this situation, the Sustainable Tree Crops Program entered Liberia in early 2006. I was now a faculty member at the University of Tennessee and fortunate enough to assist STCP and the Liberian Ministry of Agriculture with convening an international roundtable in Monrovia to examine the situation. We desired to learn from the experience of other West African cocoa producing countries and attempted to plot out a path to develop a functioning marketplace that provided remunerative prices to all actors. In addition, we examined the potential expansion of Liberian cocoa production, integrated with food crops, which could result in good quality cocoa serving as a means to lift smallholders out of poverty while addressing immediate food security concerns. The meeting resulted in important exchanges of information as well as a SWOT and PESTLE analysis which provided a platform from which to move forward.

Information gathering continued with a baseline survey, during which almost 800 households were interviewed. This effort shed light on the constraints facing farmers and how the chaotic marketplace was adversely affecting market outcomes at the farmgate. In addition, we interviewed cocoa buyers who were plying their trade up-country and exporters in Monrovia who had entered the marketplace in 2007, filling a vacuum left by the single exporter who had operated during the war years. The picture that developed was one of extensive market inefficiencies whose toll was being taken on the very cocoa farmers who aspire to rebuild their lives though a portfolio of agriculturally-oriented ventures. To assist in this effort, Dr. Jim Gockowski, from the regional STCP staff, developed an economic model to help stakeholders understand the economic effects of developing the cocoa industry in Liberia. Results were shared at another international roundtable hosted by STCP along with its partners.

Finally, this brings me to the present and looking towards the future. With the baseline data analyzed and the economic modeling complete, we set forth to work with stakeholders in developing policy prescriptions that could help guide the democratically elected Government of Liberia that is now in its third year of governance. This work culminated in a conference, held last week in Monrovia on October 17, 2008, where representatives from government, industry and development organizations came together at the STCP office to discuss a way forward from a policy perspective. As we delineated the current market situation and the challenges faced by the farmers, buyers and exporters when marketing their product, it became clear that the challenges are many but some of the solutions are beginning to surface. Certainly, missing markets (e.g., financing), imperfect information (e.g., market information) and high transaction costs continue to hamper development of the sector. Without the proper price signals and incentives being transmitted back to the farmgate, quality maintenance, from farmgate to end-user, and scale economies will never be attained. To this end, STCP and the stakeholders present took a significant step forward by agreeing that market information needs to be made available and capacity building is necessary to ensure that all actors along the marketing chain understand how to ascertain and preserve quality. With STCP playing an important facilitating role, it is my hope that these partnerships within the sector continue to evolve and that cocoa farmers, both nascent and established, can begin to reap the benefits of their labor and continue to build a stronger, more prosperous Liberia.