Ivory Coast’s Coffee, Cocoa Sector to receive funding of $267.6 Million In New Season from BNI Bank
IVORY COAST, Sept. 25 – Ivory Coast’s government-run National Investment Bank , or BNI, is set to fund the country’s cocoa and coffee industry with more than 165 billion CFA francs (about $267.6 million) during the upcoming 2023-24 crop season, the bank said on Friday.
“We’re now going into the digitalization of payments in the coffee sector-cocoa sector, which will consist in identifying all farmers, providing them loans and electronic wallets in a bid to dematerialize the payment processes, including the company handling responsibilities in the event of personal injury or property damage to third parties,” BNI Deputy General Manager Jerome Ahua told Dow Jones Newswires on Monday.
The new cocoa season in Ivory Coast officially opens in October and ends in September of each year.
For the ending 2022-2023 crop season, the bank funded the cocoa and coffee sector with XAF 187 billion.
“Next season’s investment is slightly down because the bank has been acting on a wider financial scale before and is now moving into specifics”, Ahua said, without providing more details.
The bank’s funding for the sector stood at XAF50 billion in the 2018-19 season.
Cocoa output for the 2023-24 season fell to 2.14 million metric tons in the 2022-23 season from 2.2 million tons the prior season, according to figures from the Coffee, Cocoa Council.