Victory: Largest Cocoa Company in Ghana Joins Push for Sustainability
As a result of advocacy by Mighty Earth and the hard work of others including the World Cocoa Foundation, the biggest cocoa company in Ghana, PBC Limited, has followed Côte d’Ivoire, Ghana and thirty-leading cocoa and chocolate companies in joining the Cocoa Forest Initiative to end deforestation and restore forest areas. PBC Limited controls roughly 35 percent of the Ghana’s cocoa.
As deforestation for cocoa in Ghana continues to destroy the country’s last forests, companies engaged in the industry must step up and commit to sustainability before it is too late. PBC Limited’s decision to join the Cocoa Forest Initiative is a huge step forward to ending deforestation.
PBC Limited’s Cocoa Forest Initiative action plan will focus on three major commitments:
- Forest protection and restoration,
- Sustainable production and livelihoods,
- And community engagement and social inclusion
Following the announcement, PBC Limited CEO Kofi Owusu Boateng declared: “Sustainability is the way to go; it’s a must. It is our collective duty to leave the next generation a healthy and a happy farming population. We need to understand that we are only holding the world in trust for the generation yet unborn.”
This decision puts increasing pressure on Ghanaian cocoa companies Akuafo Adamfo, Armajaro, Kuapa Kokoo, Federated Commodities, Transroyal, Adwumapa, and Cocoa Merchants Gh among others to embrace and adopt deforestation-free cocoa, supply chain traceability and agroforestry.
PBC’s change is welcome because the situation for Ghanaian forests is dire, and rainfall is affected as forests vanish. To avoid catastrophic desertification, major change in the cocoa sector is urgently needed. Mighty Earth Campaign Director Etelle Higonnet explained: ‘PBC is leading and we desperately need the other LBCs to follow. It’s all hands on deck right now to clean up the cocoa industry, turn things around to make cocoa forest-friendly, and save Ghana’s last forests before it’s too late.
