On SARA 2019, Edmond Coulibaly, Managing Director of the Hévéa-Palmier oil council, the latest body in
date set up after that of coffee - cocoa and that of cotton - cashew, explains to CommodAfrica the role
of this new organization but also the responses provided to the two sectors. It's about giving visibility
to growers' income so that they can borrow or allocate tax credits to
industrialists so that they absorb the excess production.
Can you place the Rubber-Oil Palm Council within all the organizations of the two
sectors and define its role?
The Rubber-Oil Palm Council is the regulator of the sector. At his side are the organizations
interprofessional organizations which already existed for some, others being recognized as such.
It is a pyramid where, on behalf of the State, we play the role of regulator, the one who sets up the
rules of the game and now ensures that each intervention in the sector will contribute to the overall objective
which is to relaunch the growth dynamic.
How to achieve this when the two sectors have suffered for two years from low world prices both
for rubber than for palm oil. What are your interventions at producer level but
also factories?
The government has taken up this issue. The decline in prices is primarily the result of factors
exogenous. As far as internal mechanisms are concerned, we are looking again at the
redistribution of the wealth created within these two sectors to ensure that each link is
fairly compensated.
Can you be more explicit?
We are expecting the conclusion of two studies by mid-December which should allow us to rethink the
maps. Among the avenues considered, the creation of a price support mechanism. For businesses, it
it is a matter of already controlling the risks of price fluctuations on the markets. It's already quite a challenge! imagine
for the ordinary planter... For us, it is important to restore visibility to the income of planters
because many services cannot be provided to the planter if no one has visibility on his income at
medium term or over the next three months. Imagine a bank that wants to lend to a farmer but does not
don't know how much his income will be next month. The instrument that we are going to put in place must
make it possible to settle this question of price volatility and to reduce it with an instrument that we
can drive internally.
I would add that for rubber, there is another factor that disrupts domestic marketing. It's here
overproduction. For 2019, the surplus has been estimated at 350,000 tonnes, but it will certainly be higher.
So the government authorized the export of the surplus in the form of cup bottoms. It's a
situational measure.
To work sustainably on the issue, the government decided a few weeks ago to grant
additional tax incentive measures, particularly in terms of tax credits to enable
industrialists who are already present to increase their capacities. After the adoption of this ordinance, we
are in the process of working with the Ministry of Industry and professionals in the sector, in particular
Apromac, to set up framework agreements to bind each factory operator to the State in terms
capacity increase. Our hope is that by 2021 industrial capacities will allow
reduce excess production. A situation that has led to the appearance of operators who do not play by the rules and somewhat disrupt the marketing system. This is a priority issue because
with the increase in production – we are at nearly 1.8 million tonnes today – we
export our added value to other countries.
In the palm oil sector, certainly Côte d'Ivoire only exports to the sub-region but
nevertheless, has the proliferation of campaigns against palm oil, particularly in Europe, not
no repercussions on the Ivorian sector?
The first impact is that this campaign is driving down international palm oil prices. I've got to
specify that the price served to the planter in Côte d'Ivoire is indexed to the international price. It is important that
the whole world understands that if we ruin the global palm oil economy, we ruin the
income of a thousand planters and we risk creating more precariousness in rural areas and causing
emigration to wealthier countries. In Côte d'Ivoire, more than two million people live
directly and indirectly from palm oil.
With regard to the production system in Côte d'Ivoire, we are less concerned with the
habitat destruction issues. We have a cover of 200,000 hectares on which we have a
enormous potential because we have plant material of 30 t/ha in potential and the yields are
currently 5t/ha. So we don't need to deforest to increase production, we just need
address the issue of fertilizer application. In addition, Côte d'Ivoire became involved in the RSPO very early on.
Would you consider joining the initiatives of the two palm oil production giants, Indonesia
and Malaysia, such as filing a complaint at the WTO?
I would say that we have a common destiny with other palm oil producers.
During this edition of SARA, the forest and its preservation were real issues. The ambition is to restore
20% of forest cover by 2030, what is the contribution of the two rubber and oil palm sectors?
when they contributed in part to the clearing of the forest?
This is one of the reasons that prompted the government to adopt this new forest policy which
consists in considering that, from now on, in Côte d'Ivoire we have agro-forests. To consider that we
cannot completely ignore that these rubber plants are trees. Admittedly, it is not the same degree of
carbon sequestration than a primary forest, but a rubber plantation is a quasi-forest. For the
contribution of these sectors to the preservation of the forest and the reconstitution of forests, experiments
are underway in terms of production association between rubber cultivation and forest species, such as
teak or gmelina for example. These woods which are produced will make it possible to supply units and will
reduce pressure on primary forests by partially meeting timber needs