Cocoa cooperatives in Ivory Coast are grappling with mounting unsold stock and rising debts as exporters refuse to pay the government-set farmgate price amid a global price slump. Farmers say they are being forced to accept sharply lower, unofficial offers, deepening the financial strain across the world’s top cocoa producer.

Cocoa stocks from main harvest pile up in Ivory Coast warehouses

February 17, 2026

Ange Aboa and Coulibaly Media/Reuters

A worker takes notes among unsold stocks of cocoa at the warehouse of Sekou Dagnogo, an independent cocoa buyer in Fengolo, Ivory Coast, February 11, 2026.

Luc Gnago/Reuters

Unsold bags of cocoa beans are stacked almost to the ceiling in Sekou Dagnogo's warehouse in Ivory Coast's western Duekoue town, where his cooperative is struggling to sell to exporters following a fall in global cocoa prices.

Exporters have been refusing to pay the guaranteed 2,800 CFA francs ($5.09) per kg farmgate price the government set at the start of the 2025/26 crop season, according to cooperatives. The exporters say the slump in global prices CCc2, which hit their lowest levels in more than two years last week due to falling demand, has made cocoa from the world's largest producer too expensive.

Dagnogo said he relies on the export sales to pay farmers but now unsold stock is piling up and debts are accumulating.

"Things haven't been going well for quite some time now, so everything is at a standstill for the moment and we currently owe farmers a lot of money," he told Reuters during a recent trip to Duekoue.

Dagnogo's hope is that the Coffee and Cocoa Council regulator will step in to buy the unsold bags.

In January, the regulator launched a programme to purchase 100,000 metric tons of cocoa beans that had been held for weeks and was forced to accelerate the purchases earlier this month on concerns about the declining quality of inventories stored in poor conditions.

"They have assured us that they will buy back the product," Dagnogo said.

NO PRICE OPTIONS FOR FARMERS

Farmer Frederic Kouassi Kouassi told Reuters that some buyers were offering prices as low as 1,500 CFA francs or 1,800 CFA francs per kg, which is prohibited by the regulator.

"They offer us a choice that doesn't suit us, and due to a lack of resources, we are forced to accept these prices," Kouassi Kouassi said as he harvested yellow pods with a machete at his farm in the small western village of Remikro.

He stores bags of beans in his house but is worried about accumulating too many before the start of the April-to-September mid-crop.

"If someone comes and offers you at least 500 CFA francs to sell what's there, since the trees are still alive, you accept and never get discouraged," Kouassi Kouassi said.

($1 = 550.0000 CFA francs)

-Ange Aboa and Coulibaly Media/Reuters