Nightingale corrects report about cocoa production

A REPORT on July 30, citing the Cocoa Board chief executive that 44,000 tonnes of cocoa had been produced last year was not true, Agmark managing director John Nightingale says.
Nightingale said the Cocoa Board’s own statistics showed that the tonnage had been declining year by year and could fall below 31,000 tonnes in 2019.
“This is barely 0.6 per cent of the world crop. We used to produce 2.6 per cent of the total world crop,” he said.
“The Cocoa Board’s own statistics show that only 33,235 tons was exported in 2018 down from 35,000 tonnes in 2017. Not the 44,000 or 41,000 tonnes that was stated this week.”
He said the Cocoa Board management and a minister at the Cocoa Show last week in Lae, Morobe, stated erroneously that the national cocoa tonnage was over 41,000 tonnes.
“The facts are that only 35,000 tonnes were exported in 2017 which fell to 33,235 tonnes in 2018,” he said.
“The source is the Cocoa Board statistics. Successive board managements and board members for almost 20 years have ignored formal reports as well as those of others of their failure and others to follow established quality control procedures as firmly laid down in the cocoa regulations.
“The cocoa board management in the rather distant past very successfully applied the regulations. This can be done again with direction by a strong and committed board.”
He said the recent ICCO downgrading of PNG’s fine flavour status from 90 per cent down to 70 per cent was the wakeup call that was last getting through to the board.
Nightingale said any appeal by the Cocoa Board to the ICCO on the downgrading of PNG cocoa would not be helpful and in fact show that they were in denial about the true state of the national cocoa industry.
He said the Cocoa Board’s statistics showed that Agmark had been the sole exporter and seller of second grade cocoa over the past 20 years.
“This is done as a separate grade from export quality.
“The foreign owned and managed buyers simply mix in the second grade with the good export grade.”
Nightingale said this had been pointed out many times to the CB yet they continued to ignore the obvious and continued the rhetoric of quality cocoa without specifications and detail.
Attempts to contact Cocoa Board chief executive Boutu Gaupu for his response was unsuccessful.