(Business in Cameroon) - Atlantic Cocoa Plantations SA. This is the name of the company through which Ivorian businessman Koné Dossongui will move into the production and processing of cocoa in Cameroon. With an initial capital of FCfa 10 million, the headquarters of this company are in Yaoundé, the Cameroonian capital, we learn in a legal notice.

The boss of the Atlantic group (Atlantic Télécom, Atlantic Financial Group...) already present in Cameroon through the bank of the same name, chairs the Board of this new company, while Georges Anatole Wilson is the Managing Director. The purpose of Atlantic Cocos Plantations SA is "the establishment, development and operation of agricultural plantations; the marketing of all agricultural and food; the grouping, training and management of small and medium farmers".

As a reminder, it was on 29th July 2015 that this Ivorian economic operator revealed his project for the creation of an industrial cocoa consortium in Cameroon. Received by the then Minister of Economy, Koné Dossongui specified that his agro-industrial would have three components being: the creation of cocoa farms in the country, the construction of a cocoa processing unit, and the establishment of a management structure for producers.

A project welcomed by the Cameroonian public authorities as it fits in with the cocoa and coffee sector stimulus plan, adopted by the Cameroonian in September 2014. This plan, implemented since early 2015, is meant to achieve a national cocoa production of 60,000 tons by 2020, against a current yearly average of 200,000 tons; and a bean processing volume equivalent to 70% of the national production, against 25% currently.

Brice R. Mbodiam