Smallholder cocoa growers in Sulawesi, Indonesia, have the opportunity to boost their incomes by growing new pest-resistant, high-yielding cocoa varieties developed though an Australian and Indonesian research partnership.
Indonesia has been the world’s third largest cocoa producer over the past twenty years. Cocoa is the main income source for over a million Indonesian smallholder farm families. Of these families half live in Sulawesi.
With world cocoa prices rising to around $2660/tonne, and Sulawesi cocoa growers receiving around 80 per cent of that price in their pockets, growing cocoa offers the opportunity to improve farm family incomes and enhance local economies.
However, the growers’ livelihoods are threatened because cocoa production is being cut by up to 50 per cent due to increasing pressure from pests and disease, ageing trees and falling soil fertility.
The Australian Centre for International Agricultural Research (ACIAR) has brought together Australian and Indonesian research and extension agencies, and cocoa buyer Mars Incorporated, in a strong partnership with smallholder cocoa growers to encourage replanting with the improved varieties and better crop management.
Researchers from La Trobe University, University of Sydney and Mars Symbioscience have been working with farmers to select resistant varieties of cocoa and test them in farmer fields across Sulawesi.
Mars Symbioscience, which is making a significant financial and in-kind contribution to the cocoa program, has a long-term commitment to improving the environmental, economic and social sustainability of the cocoa industry in Sulawesi.
The cocoa improvement program is part of the Smallholder Agribusiness Development Initiative in eastern Indonesia, under the Australian Indonesia Partnership. The Initiative is helping smallholder farmers move from being opportunistic and subsistence-orientated towards being profitable and productive smallholder agricultural businesses.
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