Former President John Agyekum Kufuor has said that Africa must decisively expand into chocolate manufacturing and other downstream industries to unlock greater value from its dominant cocoa production.
Delivering a keynote address at the maiden Africa Cocoa Finance & Investment Forum (ACFIF 2026) at the London Stock Exchange, John Agyekum Kufuor stressed that the continent can no longer remain a marginal player in the most profitable segments of the cocoa value chain.
He noted that while Africa produces about 70% of the world’s cocoa beans, it accounts for less than 20% of global processing and under 2% of finished chocolate output – leaving the bulk of value creation offshore.
“The true economic value lies in chocolate manufacturing, branding, innovation, and long-term capital deployment,” he said, warning that the current structure leaves African producers with roughly 10% of the value chain.
John Agyekum Kufuor described the forum as a critical platform to address long-standing structural imbalances, bringing together financiers, policymakers, and industry players to mobilise capital and drive industrialisation across the cocoa ecosystem.
Drawing on Ghana’s experience, he highlighted past policy interventions that boosted output and processing capacity, including disease control programmes, farmer pricing reforms, and deliberate investments in local processing.