(Ecofin Agency) - Due to Drought, Brazil might be forced to come back on its decision to ban cocoa imports from Cote d’Ivoire. In fact, the nation’s cocoa processing industry association (AIPC) said it was putting pressure on the government to this end. This should lead cocoa imports in the country to grow sevenfold compared to the previous year.

“For us, importing is horrible because it's always better to secure supplies from the internal market. To import, we have to make purchases six months in advance,” said Eduardo Bastor, executive director of the AIPC. The executive added that relying on Cote d’Ivoire to offset internal deficit appeared as the best thing to do. For now, Brazil imports the beans from Ghana. However, “since people know that Brazil is importing from Ghana, the price is very high,” Bastos explained.

Brazil’s cocoa output which should be around 150,000 tons will thus fall by 30% due to low performances in Bahia, the country’s main production area. “Future imports will depend in coming years on the next crops but we expect to reduce imports at least by half of this season next year,” Bastos said.

Aaron Akinocho