Due to the supply crisis, cocoa has become more expensive than copper

NEW YORK – Cocoa prices rose more than $700 a ton in one day and topped $9,000 for the first time ever, as a supply crisis grips the market and chocolate makers struggle to obtain beans.

Bloomberg reported that futures contracts in New York rose for the fourth day in a row, adding to the gains after news of financing challenges in Ghana, the second largest cocoa producer in the world.

A key financing facility may be lost in Ghana, because the crisis in its cocoa crop has left it without enough beans to secure funds. The Ghana Cocoa Board, the industry regulator known as Cocobod, relies on foreign financing to pay for cocoa beans for cocoa farmers.

Prices have risen by about 60% this month alone, and have already doubled this year. Weak harvests due to bad weather and diseases that may affect crops in West Africa, where most of the world’s cocoa is grown, and a decline in production elsewhere, have put this industry in trouble.

The rise has pushed prices toward $10,000 per ton, a level that seemed unthinkable just a few months ago, and has even made cocoa more expensive than industrial copper, according to Bloomberg.

An increase in the price of cocoa will lead to higher chocolate costs throughout the year. Some manufacturers are reducing bar sizes or promoting varieties containing other ingredients to alleviate the problem.

Crops in West Africa, the region with the highest density of cocoa cultivation, have been damaged by pests and a series of extreme weather events, threatening a third successive supply shortage.

Factories there are already suffering from closure, and new environmental regulations, expected to be imposed in European importing countries, may exacerbate the obstacles to exporting these grains.

Source: “Bloomberg”