Ivorian farms spurn coffee for more profitable crops

By Loucoumane Coulibaly

ABIDJAN (Reuters) - Ivory Coast coffee production will fall sharply this year as growers stung by low farmgate prices last season turn to more lucrative crops or abandon their plantations entirely, farmers and exporters said on Thursday.

The gloomy outlook adds to the West African nation's other agricultural woes, including dramatic declines in cocoa output, that have put the conflict-scarred country's main economic engine at risk after years of underinvestment.

Coffee output could end up around 100,000 tonnes in the 2009-10 season, down 50 percent from last year's bumper crop of 150,000 tonnes, said a purchasing manager for one international coffee export company.

"We're waiting for a harvest that will range between 80,000 and 100,000 tonnes, no more," he said. "The planters are not getting enough money to provide for their families, let alone for taking care of their plantations," he said.

Growers said that while coffee production last year was strong, farmgate prices fell to around 125 CFA francs per kilgram from 500 to 600 CFA francs on average over the previous three years.

"The 2008-09 season was a catastrophe," said Joseph Amani, a coffee grower near Abengourou in Ivory Coast's eastern region.

"I still have 3.5 tonnes of coffee from last season that I couldn't sell because the price was so low and the merchants had very little interest. It is the same case for many other growers," he added.

Numerous farms in the coffee growing regions of Aboisso and Abengourou were converted earlier this year into rubber or cocoa plantations due to the poor returns offered by the coffee business, farmers said.