ACCRA, Ghana (AFP) — Ghana on Thursday announced it was raising the price paid to cocoa farmers, following a recent hike by its neighbour, top producer Ivory Coast.

Accra is raising rates by 12.3 per cent, from 3,228.75 to 3,625 cedis ($257 to $289) per 64-kilogramme bag, or 58,000 cedis per tonne.

That puts Ghana’s rate of $4.5 per kilogramme just behind Ivory Coast, which increased its prices on Wednesday to a record 2,800 CFA ($5) per kilogramme.

In August, Ghana had announced prices for the 2025-26 season at 51,660 cedis per tonne, a more than 60 per cent increase in dollar terms, though the currency has weakened against the dollar since then.

The new price hike, effective Friday, “reflects government’s continued commitment to ensuring farmers receive fair value for their efforts,” Finance Minister Cassiel Ato Forson told reporters.

Price controls in the world’s second-largest cocoa producer are meant to stabilise earnings for farmers, especially during price dips.

But critics say they have lagged behind market highs, especially in recent years as global prices have spiked.

In response, some farmers have joined the country’s gold rush, selling off land to informal miners — many of whom have left environmental destruction in their wake, further squeezing production.

Getting fair prices for farmers — at the bottom of cocoa’s global value chain — has long been a goal of both activists and West African governments, with fingers pointed at both private firms and buyers as well as official corruption.

The Ghanaian government under President John Mahama has pledged to raise cocoa farmers’ share of export earnings to at least 70 per cent of the Free-On-Board (FOB) value — the price of cocoa at the point it is loaded onto a ship for export.

Forson also announced the continuation of support programmes for farmers, including free fertilisers, pesticides and spraying machines, as well as a new scholarship scheme for the children of cocoa farmers starting in the 2026/27 academic year.