La filière Cacao d’Haïti : Un exemple de succès d’échanges Sud-Sud et de partenariat Nord-Sud

• Main Author: Jean Chesnel Jean
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Published: Institut Veolia Environnement 2013-12-01
• Series: Field Actions Science Reports
• Subjects: Cocoa; Cocoa sector; Fermentation; Haiti; ICCO; Local cooperatives
• Online Access: http://journals.openedition.org/factsreports/2825
• ISSN: 1867-139X; 1867-8521

Haitian cocoa consists mainly of the Criollo and Trinitario varieties, which are in strong demand around the world and are used in high-quality chocolate production. But the potential of Haiti’s cocoa has never been optimized: it has long been sold on the international market in the form of ordinary unfermented cocoa. Only recently have producers become aware of the benefits of producing fermented cocoa. In 2009, thanks to technical assistance from the Peruvian cooperative CEPICAFE for the Haitian cooperative network FECCANO, and thanks to support from the French NGO Agronomes et Vétérinaires Sans Frontières (AVSF), their fermented cocoa output was immediately taken up and marketed by European firms, including the French fair-trade company Ethiquable. Since then, the global quality cocoa market has opened up to Haitian cocoa. At the local level, the economic, social and environmental impacts of this innovation are significant. There are two main lessons to be drawn from this experience: (i) exchanges between developing countries should be stepped up in agricultural assistance programs, as the “success stories” identified in the different countries involved have a higher potential for replication; (ii) collaborative business relationships, initiated some years ago now by certain buyers from developed countries, can provide more sustainable support for the development of family agriculture in developing countries. International cooperation, with innovative approaches such as the one adopted in this case by AVSF can, therefore, make an effective contribution to the agricultural development of developing countries. To consolidate the impetus given to Haiti’s cocoa industry by cocoa fermentation, it is essential to focus interventions on increasing the output of quality cocoa, on better targeting of niche markets, on reinforcing small-producer cooperatives, and on improving local governance in the cocoa sector.