According to a Reuters report, the Groupement des Négociants Ivoriens (GNI), which brings together about fifteen (15) small Ivorian exporters and shredders and which has an estimated purchasing and export capacity of 300,000 tons of cocoa beans, called on the Ivorian regulator of the cocoa sector to take urgent measures to reform the marketing system, in a letter addressed to the CCC on Friday, January 22, called on the Ivorian regulator of the cocoa sector to take urgent measures to reform the marketing system. ext& To ensure that exports of unprocessed beans are attributed to Ivorians and to end the monopoly of the six (6) multinationals installed in Côte d'Ivoire (Cargill, Barry-Callebaut, Olam, Touton, Sucden and Ecom) who buy 100% of the harvest each year. Of these six (6) multinationals, three (3) such as Cargill, Olam and Barry-Callebaut alone buy 75% of the harvest and combine the license to process and export beans.

To this end, the GNI requests that the CCC require these six (6) multinationals to buy beans and semi-finished products with local Ivorian companies, according to the capacity of each local exporter and processor.

Ivorian exporters, grouped within the GNI, therefore recommend to the CCC, starting this season, that 20 to 30% of the export contracts of local subsidiaries of multinationals be allocated automatically and obligatorily to Ivorian exporters and processors, in the form of international contracts (international courier).

In addition, to encourage local processing by multinationals and keep Ivorian bean exporters in operation, the GNI believes that “it is essential that exports of unprocessed beans in Côte d'Ivoire be attributed in priority to Ivorian exporters and export structures belonging to the CCC”.

Today, following the 2012 reform, these international contracts, which are charged only by Ivorian processors and exporters and which the CCC can only sell to the 6 multinationals in Côte d'Ivoire, may or may not be purchased by them, freely and optionally. These international contracts are therefore generally overlooked, or even ignored by the six (6) multinationals engaged in exporting beans themselves, via their Ivorian subsidiaries, for their factories in Europe, the USA and Asia. According to the GNI, “this situation does not allow Ivorian processors and exporters to have a viable business” and hampers the local processing of beans, 70% of which are exported to Europe, regardless of the transformation incentives that Côte d'Ivoire offers to these multinationals.

Thus, the GNI affirms that “when an Ivorian or foreign company invests in processing, as well as in the export of beans, the investor has no buyer of semi-finished products, except for the 6 multinationals installed in Côte d'Ivoire, which are its competitors”. This is explained, according to the GNI, by the fact that the chocolatiers who are the end users have a tacit agreement with these six (6) multinationals that are their exclusive representatives and suppliers in Côte d'Ivoire, unlike Ghana.

Hence the need to impose on these six (6) multinationals, in exchange for their presence in Côte d'Ivoire, a minimum of 20% of international contracts from the CCC so that Ivorian processors and exporters can sell their products.

For the GNI “it seems entirely legitimate that, when a multinational buys volume through its subsidiary in Côte d'Ivoire, it is obliged to buy 20 to 30% of its needs through national processors and exporters.


In addition, GNI members want to see the CCC play the same role as Cocobod in Ghana by selling beans directly to chocolate makers, without going through traders or shredders installed in Côte d'Ivoire. According to them, this would avoid the problem of unsold contracts or stocks abandoned in the hands of cooperatives and planters that the country is currently experiencing.

“Chocolatiers Mars, Mondelez, Nestlé, Ferrero, Meiji Co, Hershey, Lindt, Orion Corp, Blommer, Toms International, Valrhona, etc. should be urged to buy exclusively from the six (6) multinationals in Côte d'Ivoire, to also contract with the CCC a volume equivalent to the capacities of Ivorian processors and exporters, which they will charge on behalf of the CCC. “, reads the letter sent to the CCC by the GNI. These chocolatiers, as with Cocobod in Ghana, have no counterparty risk with the CCC since it is the Ivorian State.

For the GNI, it is therefore the monopoly of these six (6) multinationals in the purchase and export of cocoa beans and semi-finished products that currently causes the accumulation of cocoa stocks in the fields and unsold contracts because they have reached their purchasing volumes, the CCC having no other international buyers than these six (6) multinationals who buy 100% of the Ivorian cocoa harvest directly through their low branches & eacute; are in the country or directly from their headquarters.

For the GNI, ending the monopoly of multinationals by selling in part directly to chocolate makers as Ghana does through Cocobod, without going through multinational traders and shredders, will allow Côte d'Ivoire to have control over its cocoa sales and stocks.

“It seems important to us that the CCC set itself the objective of also selling international contracts for semi-finished products and beans directly to chocolatiers, not for the sole benefit of Ivorian processors and exporters, but also to be able to diversify Côte d'Ivoire's client portfolio, beyond the six (6) multinationals installed on its territory. This will prevent the CCC from situations like the one this year where the six multinationals, after covering the needs for their factories, refuse to buy additional cocoa without making significant margins,” reads the GNI letter addressed to the CCC.

The GNI also denounced the exclusive management of contracts for certified beans by these six (6) multinationals, which, thanks to this, have a significant financial bonus and can buy certified beans more expensive from cooperatives and buyers.

It requires that, systematically, 50% of the international contracts that are awarded to Ivorian exporters be certified bean contracts. Certified beans now represent 50% of Ivorian cocoa production and are exclusively purchased by multinationals on behalf of chocolate makers who finance sustainability programs that these multinationals conduct on the ground.

“Thus, the six (6) multinationals established in Côte d'Ivoire that currently benefit, unfairly, from 100% of certified contracts from chocolatiers will lose, to the benefit of Ivorian exporters, a volume corresponding to only 10 to 15% of the volumes sold. This will allow Ivorian exporters, excluded from the certification programs of Ivorian producers, to survive and continue to export Ivorian cocoa. ”

“We are therefore excluded from the chocolatiers' market and certification programs to the sole benefit of our six (6) competitors — customers, the exclusive representatives and suppliers of chocolatiers in Côte d'Ivoire