Preba Arkaah, founder of the premium chocolate company Mansa Gold, is advocating an immediate review of policies which ban manufacturers of cocoa products from buying cocoa beans directly from farmers in Ghana.
She argues that the law in its current state makes it difficult to attract indigenous entrepreneurs into cocoa processing ventures such as chocolate-making, thereby affecting investment into the sector.
Speaking with Nana Yaa Mensah on The Asaase Breakfast Show on Wednesday (3 February) about entrepreneurship and cocoa as part of Asaase Radio’s Cocoa Affair – a month-long season of programmes – Arkaah said the law is not in the interest of Ghanaian investors who might want to support the manufacturing of cocoa products such as chocolate.
Making Ghana chocolate
“The law actually says that nobody can buy directly from the farmer,” Arkaah said. “Now you and I know that if you are going to do something, you must experiment. And if you are not growing the item yourself the only way you can experiment is if you can acquire that item.”
She added: “It is the only reason we don’t have an indigenous chocolate industry in this country. It is because we have legislated against it.
“If we want to make real change and grow the industry, we must address this part of legislation.”
Over-regulation
Arkaah also expressed reservations about COCOBOD’s decision to regulate activities of players in the cocoa processing sector.
“We are also facing an attempt to legislate us from COCOBOD … I understand and everyone understands that cocoa is a major source of revenue for Ghana.
“We accept and understand that, but there is no reason why we should not have this source of revenue and at the same time extrapolate that out and gain additional revenue from growing a new industry,” she said.
Job creation
Arkaah is hopeful that if the policy is reviewed it will encourage more Ghanaian entrepreneurs to venture into cocoa processing, and thereby create more jobs.
“We will be creating jobs locally. At present, when we talk about encouraging processes, most of the processors we have are the big companies. You can see they have set up huge operations here in Ghana because they make an awful lot of money.”
Stay tuned to Asaase Radio throughout the month of February as we bring you reports, documentaries and insightful interviews on personalities and developments in the cocoa sector as part of our month-long celebration of chocolate: the Cocoa Affair.
Fred Dzakpata
Asaase Radio 99.5 – tune in or log on to broadcasts online
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