Cocoa Farmers Put Themselves on a Salary Through Sustainable and Traceable Cocoa Farming

For two seasons now, the management team of SOCOOPEC-MK (cocoa farmers cooperative) has decided that their farmers’ cocoa payments will be divided in two. Half is directly paid to the farmers after their sale and the other half is saved in a specific micro-finance institution. The saved amount is then divided into 12 parts and the farmer receives one part every month as salary. After withholding post-harvest handling charges from their sales, members still receive around USD 2/kg, which is more than 35% higher than what they receive on conventional cocoa.
Abiding by such a principle is quite challenging yet still better compared to the financial stress that cocoa farmers go through during low crop season when there is no revenue from cocoa. It is worth noting that nowadays, cocoa buyers are more and more being compelled by chocolate consumers to provide more details on the traceability of the beans that were used to manufacture their chocolate. Despite the level of discipline, this cooperative requires from its farmers, their number has almost doubled and is expected to keep increasing with the demand for such specialty cocoa.