Ecuador will outpace Brazil this year to become the top cocoa producing country in the Americas. Ecuador’s Cocoa Exporters Association, known as Anecacao forecasts that the country’s cocoa harvest will increase 9% to 240,000 tons this year – making it 14% higher than the association’s previous estimate of 210,00 tons and 20% higher than Bloomberg’s estimate for Brazil’s 2014 production. The unexpected higher output comes after Ecuador’s government implemented assistance programs, new plantings have come into production, and the expected El Nino did not materialize. A new trade agreement with the EU, the world’s top consumer of high-end chocolate, will also support advances in the country’s cocoa industry. Repeated outbreaks of witch’s broom fungus since the 1980’s have hurt Brazil’s cocoa sector and have discouraged new planting, and an additional outbreak has cut the country’s cocoa crop last year. Growers in Ecuador are working with the government to increase yields to a goal of 20 quintals (2,000 pounds) per hectare and to establish lines of credit for growers. Cocoa futures in New York so far this year have increased 19% to $3,216 per ton and may rise to $3,400 per ton by the end of the year but are expected to retreat to $2,992 per ton in 2015.
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