Former Ghanaian President John Agyekum Kufuor will deliver a Special Address at the inaugural Africa Cocoa Finance and Investment Forum (ACFIF 2026) at the London Stock Exchange on May 6, 2026, offering a historical and forward-looking perspective on Africa’s cocoa economy at a moment when the industry is navigating one of its most turbulent periods in decades.
Kufuor’s address, themed “Africa Cocoa Vision 2050: Historical Reflections and Future Pathways,” is expected to draw on his administration’s transformation of Ghana’s cocoa sector between 2001 and 2008. During that period, production rose from approximately 340,000 tonnes to more than 700,000 tonnes annually, driven by the nationwide institutionalisation of mass spraying programmes and the introduction of fertiliser support schemes. His government also created the policy conditions that attracted major processors including Barry Callebaut, Olam, Cargill, Niche Cocoa, and CHOCOMAC, laying the foundation for Ghana’s modern cocoa processing industry and contributing to the country’s historic one-million-tonne harvest in the 2010/11 season.
The forum convenes global investors, policymakers, development institutions, and private sector leaders to explore investment opportunities across Africa’s cocoa value chain. Its agenda reflects a sector under structural pressure. Global cocoa prices collapsed from historic highs above $12,000 per tonne in 2024 to below $3,000 earlier in 2026, forcing Ghana to cut its farmgate price by 28.6 percent in February and triggering a liquidity crisis that left farmers across multiple regions unpaid since November 2025.
A high-level panel on “Africa Cocoa Vision 2050: Opportunities for Regional Growth and Transformation” will include Olasunkanmi Owoyemi, Managing Director of Sunbeth Global Concepts, and H.E. Alex Assanvo, Executive Secretary of the Côte d’Ivoire-Ghana Cocoa Initiative (ICCIG), the bilateral coordination body that has managed cross-border pricing alignment between West Africa’s two dominant producers throughout the current crisis.
A second session, “Reimagining Cocoa Value Addition: Financing Chocolate Manufacturing, Nutraceuticals and Pharmaceutical Innovation,” will address opportunities beyond primary processing. Patricia Poku-Diaby of Plot Enterprises and Vishnu Kakra, Global Business Head for Cocoa at Johnvents Industries of Nigeria, will contribute to that discussion.
International Cocoa Organization (ICCO) Executive Director Michel Arrion will introduce the African Cocoa Exchange (AfCX), a proposed market transparency platform aimed at improving price discovery and strengthening Africa’s position in global cocoa trade systems.
ACFIF 2026 is convened by Cocoa Trade and Invest Africa and DMA Invest, in collaboration with the Institute of Directors (IoD) Africa Group. The forum arrives as Ghana has mandated that at least 50 percent of its cocoa be processed domestically from the 2026/27 season, a structural shift that, if achieved, would fundamentally alter the economics of the country’s most important agricultural export.
