(Business in Cameroon) - On June 26, 2018, Destination chocolatiers engagés, a label aimed at providing the expertise of French chocolate makers to Cameroonian producers for the production of excellent quality cocoa was launched in Paris. This launch was conducted by the president of the French Confederation of chocolate makers and confectioners (Confédération des chocolatiers et confiseurs de France), Frédéric Chambeau, and Appolinaire Ngwé, president of the Cameroonian Cocoa and coffee council (Conseil interprofessionnel du cacao et du café-CICC).
“This label is the materialization of the collaboration we initiated with Cameroon through the Coffee and Cocoa council for an improvement of the quality of the country’s cocoa”, Frédéric Chambeau explained. “The aim here is to produce better quality cocoa, which meets the requirements of the master chocolate makers, and produce it on a larger scale, well beyond the small cooperatives. In that regard, the CICC promised to set cocoa post-harvest processing centers”, said Omer Gatien Malédy, the executive secretary of CICC. The secretary also explained that apart from the three processing centers built for cooperatives in the Coastal and Central regions, two large centers are being built in the country.
It is worth noting that the first processing center was inaugurated in Nkog-Ekogo, in the Central region on November 7, 2017. This village located in Lékié, the largest production basin in Cameroon, is, by the way, the place where Cameroonian producers and French chocolate makers’ collaboration started fortuitously.
Indeed, according to Christophe Bertrand, French chocolate maker, in September 2016, a woman named Aristide Tchemtchoua contacted him via Facebook inquiring whether he was interested in buying cocoa from her. Touched by the cocoa producer’s approach, he agreed to receive samples and the woman was to pay for all the related fees. “Well, she agreed to it. She sent me 250 kg of the bean by borrowing €700 (about CFA460,000),which is about a year’s salary in her country”, said the chocolate maker impressed with his business partner’s determination.
Since then, Chistophe Bertrand came more than once to Cameroon followed by members of the Confédération des chocolatiers et confiseurs de France, who signed long-term partnership agreements with Cameroonian producers. Thanks to these partnerships, the producers are able to sell their excellent quality beans at up to CFA2,000 per kilogram against CFA1,000 offered in the local market.
Brice R. Mbodiam