ACCRA – Ghana’s cocoa regulator signed a 1.7 billion dollars loan with international banks to finance purchases for the next cocoa season, a spokesman said.
Ghana is the world’s second biggest producer of cocoa.
This year’s facility, signed in Paris, is the largest soft commodity deal in sub-Saharan Africa, according to the regulator, Cocobod, and an industry insider.
The loan was oversubscribed by 15 per cent. [eap_ad_1] Cocobod will receive an additional 200 million dollars on demand to be drawn in the first three months next year, said the Cocobod spokesman, Noah Amenya.
“The government is committed to paying them farmers realistic prices to build their confidence in the cocoa business and attract young people to go into cocoa farming,” he said.
Ghana raised 1.2 billion dollars in a similar loan last year.
It is expected to raise producer prices at which Cocobod buys cocoa from farmers at the onset of the new season in October.
Cocobod is hoping to harvest at least 900,000 tonnes of cocoa in the 2014/15 crop year. (Reuters/NAN)
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