Ivory Coast’s Cashew Production Seen Rising 4.2% in 2014

Cashew production in Ivory Coast, the world’s second-biggest producer, will climb 4.2 percent this year, according to the industry’s regulator.

Production will be 500,000 metric tons compared with 480,000 tons last year, Malamine Sanogo, general director of the Cotton-Cashew Council, said in a May 28 interview. About 450,000 farmers grow the nut in the country.

A drought in some growing regions during the second flowering in late March cut yields and lowered the production potential, Sanogo said. The nuts are harvested from January to June, with a main crop running from January to April. India is the world’s largest producer.

Smuggling into neigboring countries, such as Burkina Faso and Ghana, dropped this year to about 5,000 tons from as much as 80,000 tons last year, Sanogo said.“The border controls have been reinforced,” Sanogo said. “There is a political will to tackle this problem.”

Ivory Coast decided earlier this month to maintain the farmgate price at 225 CFA francs (46 U.S. cents) a kilogram (2.2 pounds) for the small crop. The Cotton-Cashew Council was set up last year to regulate the sector and assist farmers, Sanogo said.

The West African nation also aims to process 80 percent of its cashew production by 2020. Ivory Coast has a processing capacity of 60,000 tons a year, Sanogo said.

- Bloomberg