Investors plan cocoa processing factory in A/Ibom

A group of investors has announced plans to set up a cocoa-processing factory in Akwa Ibom State to handle value addition that will generate more than 5600 jobs.

Akwa Ibom is ranked fourth in the production of cocoa nationwide, but smallholder farmers without value addition activities handle most of the production activities.

The facilitator of the project, Abraham Kay, who announced plans to set up cocoa processing factory when he visited Governor Udom Emmanuel in Uyo, the state capital, said Akwa Ibom had the potentials of becoming the number one cocoa producer in the country that could attract enormous revenue to the state

Kay, who is also the facilitator of John Kouffour Foundation, Ghana, said the cocoa programme would include developing 10,000 hectares of hybrid cocoa within five years with an expected yield of 2 metric tons per hectare, would create tremendous opportunities for sustainable livelihood from cocoa production and generate income opportunities for farmers.

In addition, he said the project would ‘’generate significant cocoa revenues for the state in the face of the dwindling oil revenue.’’

Earlier, Udom announced plans by the state government to partner tree global of Netherlands, John Kouffour Foundation and Bill and Melinda Gates of the United States to become a leading producer of cocoa, thus reducing the annual global production deficit of one million tons.