Despite efforts to promote agroforestry in the cocoa sector in West Africa, farmers have been slow to adopt it. In light of its benefits — sustainability, increased resilience of farmer livelihoods, and contribution to climate change mitigation and biodiversity conservation — several private companies have committed to promoting agroforestry in the cocoa sector.
To better understand how these commitments were being implemented, a series of case studies looked at the approaches of six cocoa and chocolate companies operating in Ghana and Côte d’Ivoire. By combining insights from the case studies with findings from the literature, the initiative made recommendations for private companies and the broader cocoa sector to improve their agroforestry strategies.
The case studies show interesting differences among the agroforestry models promoted by the companies, which range from simple cocoa agroforestry to highly diverse dynamic agroforestry. Moreover, companies use a range of strategies to encourage and support farmers to adopt agroforestry. Some strategies focus on overcoming barriers to agroforestry adoption (e.g., difficulties in registering land title), while others focus on making agroforestry more economically attractive to farmers (e.g., providing payments for ecosystem services). The case studies identified several ways to strengthen agroforestry strategies, including developing more tailored approaches to agroforestry, the use of farmer-managed natural regeneration, and expanding cooperatives’ agroforestry extension and support services.
Ultimately, for agroforestry to be adopted at scale and reach its full potential in contributing to thriving, resilient and biodiverse landscapes, livelihoods and cocoa supply chains, all actors need to rally behind a coordinated vision for agroforestry and work together to achieve it. Such a collaboration should reframe agroforestry as a locally owned solution, and provide an approach that is centred on farmers.
