Threat To Ghana's Cocoa Industry From Ukraine

 Author's note: This piece was meant to be saved as a draft,  and  posted on 1/4/2014 - but due to a mix-up, it was inadvertently posted today, alas - making it the world's first 2014 1st April opinion piece, as it were. A thousand apologies all round. Please read on,  in the traditional 1st April spirit, so to speak:

Ukrainian presidential candidate,  Mr. Petro Poroshenko, the billionaire chocolate king of Ukraine, who is tipped to win the upcoming 25th May, 2014,  presidential election in Ukraine, is apparently planning to collaborate with Monsanto to produce GM frost-resistant cocoa beans in Ukraine.

Apparently Mr. Poroshenko, whose company Roshen,  is Ukraine's biggest chocolate   manufacturer, believes that he will be able to do so within two years. And his ambition is to become the world's biggest producer of cocoa beans - with an  annual  production rate of some 5 million metric tonnes.

 The curious thing, is that the president of the Ivory Coast, President Alhassan Quattara, is said to be looking forward to assisting Mr. Poroshenko to produce GM  cocoa beans  in Ukraine. As a producer of high quality cocoa beans, Ghana must read the writing on the wall - Poroshenko's GM cocoa is a harbinger of things to come.

 To counter the threat posed by the Poroshenko-Monsanto GM cocoa beans  alliance, those  charged with overseeing  Ghana's cocoa industry, must act swiftly to end the baleful  influence and  power of the vested interests, which  supply synthetic fertilisers and pesticides to cocoa farmers. It is they whose stranglehold on the Ghana Cocoa Board's  (COCOBOD)  purchases of inputs for cocoa farmers, makes it impossible for suppliers of organic fertilisers and natural pesticides, to  sell their products in Ghana.
 
To secure the long-term future of the cocoa industry in Ghana, the Ghana Cocoa Board (COCOBOD) must take steps to ensure  that Ghana becomes  the world's biggest producer of certified organic cocoa beans. Strategically, that is the most effective way to counter the threat posed by Poroshenko's ambition to grow GM frost-resistant cocoa beans in Ukraine.

The threat Poroshenko poses is real. And his GM frost-resistant cocoa, which  grows in temperate regions,  idea, is not as outlandish as it sounds. Let us carve out  a niche as the world's biggest producer of  certified organic cocoa beans to neutralise him. One hopes the powers that be will be up to the task ahead - and act now above all. Not tomorrow - when it will be way too late.

They have a powerful ally in the Latvian company BioDeposit - whose range of organic agricultural inputs could help Ghana produce 1 million metric tonnes of certified organic cocoa beans on a regular basis. They could repeat the miracle they have wrought for coffee farmers in East Africa here too - and help boost the production of  certified  organic cocoa beans in Ghana in record time. Ghana must counter the threat to its cocoa industry from Ukraine.  Now. Not tomorrow. A word to the wise...