Ghana’s cocoa industry, long regarded as one of the most stable pillars of the national economy, is facing one of its most severe disruptions in decades, as farmers across cocoa-growing regions remain unpaid for beans delivered since November 2025.

The crisis has not only stalled cocoa purchasing. Still, it has also triggered wider economic distress in farming communities, affecting labourers, local traders, transporters, and input suppliers who depend on the seasonal cash flow from cocoa.

At the centre of the crisis is a simple but devastating reality: farmers have cocoa beans, government is unable to pay for them, and as a result, the state marketing system has virtually ground to a halt. COCOBOD, which traditionally purchases cocoa through Licensed Buying Companies and the Cocoa Marketing Company, is now reportedly refusing to accept new cocoa beans because it lacks the liquidity to pay for existing stocks. Warehouses are filled with unsold cocoa, while farmers remain unpaid for months, disrupting the entire local economy in cocoa-producing districts.

This situation has had cascading effects. Labourers who depend on seasonal cocoa income cannot be paid, farm inputs for pest control and disease management are delayed, and maintenance of cocoa farms is being neglected.

The longer the crisis persists, the greater the risk to both current production and future harvests, which raises concerns about long-term damage to the cocoa industry.

Historically, Ghana has managed cocoa financing through a structured system of forward sales, export contracts, and syndicated trade finance facilities. Even in periods of high debt and fiscal pressure, the system ensured that farmers were paid promptly. This was evident during the eight-year tenure of the Aidoo-led COCOBOD management, which inherited both liabilities and assets in 2016 and also left liabilities and assets at the end of its term. Despite those financial pressures, farmers were paid consistently, and the cocoa market functioned without the type of paralysis currently being experienced.

The current crisis, according to industry insiders and analysts, is not primarily the result of historical debts or legacy liabilities, but rather a combination of macroeconomic policy choices and specific trading decisions taken by the current COCOBOD management.

One major structural factor has been exchange rate differentials, driven by government’s broader macroeconomic and foreign exchange management policies. These have affected the cedi value of cocoa revenues and widened the gap between international dollar prices and domestic payment obligations to farmers.

However, the more immediate trigger is linked to trading strategy. By the time the new administration took office in January 2025, the previous COCOBOD management had already begun forward sales of the 2025 cocoa crop from October 2024, at prices around $8,000 per tonne. These forward contracts created price certainty and revenue stability, which partly explained why the new government was able to increase the producer price to farmers by about GH¢500 per bag—building on a pricing structure previously anchored around international prices near $6,000 per tonne.

After the change in administration, the Randy Abbey-led COCOBOD management reportedly altered this strategy. Instead of continuing forward sales for the 2026 cocoa crop, management opted to pause forward contracting and wait for spot market sales, hoping to benefit from even higher prices. This approach, however, exposed Ghana to market volatility.

Contrary to expectations, international cocoa prices later fell sharply from around $10,000 to about $4,000 per tonne.

This sudden drop left COCOBOD trapped in a financial squeeze. At a market price of $4,000 per tonne, the Board cannot sell cocoa profitably while still paying farmers the current producer price of about GH¢3,600 per bag. As a result, cocoa already purchased cannot be sold without losses, leading to stockpiles in warehouses and a liquidity crisis.

Because the cocoa cannot be sold, revenue does not flow in.

Because revenue does not flow in, COCOBOD cannot pay for cocoa already purchased. And because existing cocoa remains unpaid, COCOBOD is unable to accept new beans from farmers. The system has therefore locked itself into a vicious cycle of unsold stock, unpaid farmers, and halted purchasing.

The options available to government and COCOBOD are limited and politically sensitive. One option is to reduce the producer price paid to farmers so cocoa can be sold at current market prices—an approach that would directly harm farmer incomes. Another is for government to inject funds to bridge the gap between international prices and domestic payments, a difficult option given fiscal constraints. A third is macroeconomic intervention to improve cedi value returns from cocoa exports, though this depends on broader currency and forex policy reforms.

As the debate intensifies, some officials have attempted to link the crisis to historical debts, syndicated loans, and legacy financial obligations. However, industry experts have challenged this narrative. Ghana has never defaulted on its cocoa syndicated loans in over 30 years of participation in the facility. In fact, in the 2024/25 season, Ghana chose not to use a syndicated loan model, opting instead to sell cocoa directly and receive payments from buyers without bank intermediation—saving on interest costs. This decision was not due to an inability to access syndicated finance, but rather a strategic choice to reduce financing costs.

Forward sales, analysts emphasize, are not dependent on syndicated loans. They are trading instruments, not financing tools. In practice, Ghana conducts forward sales first and then uses those contracts as collateral to secure syndicated loans. The loan does not enable forward sales; rather, forward sales enable financing. In 2024, Ghana sold cocoa forward and simply removed the bank from the transaction chain, collecting payments directly from buyers.

This background undermines claims that the absence of syndicated loans prevented forward sales. The issue, critics argue, is not financing access but the strategic decision to abandon forward sales in favour of spot market speculation at a time of peak prices.

As a result, what began as a calculated trading gamble has evolved into a national crisis affecting farmers’ livelihoods and the stability of the cocoa sector. Communities that depend almost entirely on cocoa income are bearing the brunt of the consequences, with months of unpaid deliveries crippling local economies.

For many stakeholders, the situation boils down to a single cause and a single problem: poor trading decisions taken at a critical moment in the market cycle.

While debts, liabilities, and macroeconomic pressures exist, they are not seen as the direct trigger of the current paralysis. Those liabilities existed before, yet farmers were paid and cocoa flowed.

Today, cocoa is stranded, farmers are unpaid, and confidence in the system is eroding. The longer the crisis continues, the greater the risk of long-term damage to the cocoa reputation on the global market and to the livelihoods of hundreds of thousands of farming households.

However, as pressure mounts, calls are growing for decisive action, transparency, and policy clarity—less deflection, fewer political explanations, and more concrete solutions to restore payments, stabilize the market, and return the cocoa sector to functional normalcy.