Program Summary

Ecuador is believed to be the birthplace of cocoa and has had a long and illustrious history of cocoa production and export to the main cocoa-processing and -consuming countries of the world.  There are close to 100,000 smallholder cocoa farmers in Ecuador who account for approximately 85-90 percent of total cocoa production in the country. However, during the past 15-25 years, this success has been undone resulting in many small producers losing interest and practically abandoning any kind of productive work in terms of crop management causing average cocoa production levels to go down.

Small cocoa producers face a series of problems including poor planning, crop management, marketing, and a low level of farmer organization. On many farms cocoa trees are practically abandoned with no pruning or tree shaping conducted and no phytosanitary pruning either. Tree spacing is irregular and many farmers do not practice fertilization or weed control. Fungal diseases such as monilia and witch’s broom are also a major problem, provoking losses of an estimated $50 million annually.

In the area of post-harvest management, many farmers are not fermenting beans sufficiently causing quality problems and a discounted price. In addition, most farmers sell their cocoa individually when they need cash and so have little or no bargaining power with the intermediaries operating near their farm. These intermediaries can take advantage of the farmers’ economic and geographic situation, paying them less than if the farmers united and sold in volume and with better information about quality standards and price.

Recognizing the need to provide technical assistance to Ecuadorian cocoa producers, the United States Department of Agriculture awarded ACDI/VOCA a three-year, $4.7 million Food for Progress project to promote increased production of cocoa in Ecuador. ACDI/VOCA’s SUCCESS Alliance partner, The World Cocoa Foundation (WCF), is also providing vital technical assistance and other resources.

The SUCCESS Alliance program in Ecuador seeks to:

• Promote increases in productivity and quality of cocoa at the farm level by training of 21,000 small-scale cocoa farmers using the Farmer Field School (FFS) methodology
• Promote rehabilitation and/or renewal of one million old, unproductive cocoa plantings
• Work with farmer associations to establish and strengthen nurseries and improve access to quality planting material and train farmers in grafting techniques to improve their tree stock using locally available material.
• Strengthen or develop approximately 10 cocoa farmer associations by assisting farmers associations to:
• Improve access to technical assistance
• Improve farm management skills through the participation in Farming as a Business (FaaB) training
• Strengthen management capacity and improve their understanding and implementation of association principles
• Improve post harvest handling and marketing practices

The following has been accomplished to date:

• Project facilitators have trained over 3,000 farmers utilizing the Farmer Field School methodology which provides farmers with practical exercises in integrated crop management to include cultural control of the primary cocoa diseases, improvement of tree stock through grafting and rehabilitation, and post-harvest management procedures among other themes. These farmers are located in Guayas, Los Rios and a few in Manabi provinces.
• Training has begun for approximately 5,000 farmers in the second cycle of FFS starting in January 2006 and are being held in the four provinces that have the highest concentration of smallholder cocoa farmers. The program is expanding to Esmeraldas province for the first time and will operate in a larger area in Manabi province. Activities will continue at the same level in Guayas and Los Rios provinces as well.
• Proposals to strengthen farmers associations are being finalized with partners in all four of the project provinces. Activities funded under these projects will focus on the democratic principals of farmers' associations, management capacity, marketing opportunities and, in some cases, the establishment of tree nurseries for plant renewal.