To solve this, the COCOBOD has reviewed upwards, the initial treatment grant which is part of the compensation package for landowners and cocoa farmers who agree to cut and replant their Cocoa Swollen Shoot Virus-affected cocoa farms under the on-going National Cocoa Rehabilitation Programme. The initial treatment grant, which was pegged at GH¢552.96, has now been increased to GH¢1000.00 per hectare.
“Out of every five hectares of cocoa farm, two hectares are infected”, the Chief Executive Officer of COCOBOD, Mr Joseph Boahen Aidoo said this at Sefwi Wiawso in the Western North Region recently.
Landowners and cocoa farmers are thereby advised to allow their infected trees to be cut down and replanted with high-yielding, early-bearing and disease-tolerant seedlings for increased and sustainable yield to forestall any decline in production output.
According to Mr Aidoo, the cost of cutting the infected cocoa trees and replanting
will be borne by the government and COCOBOD.
In addition, plantain suckers and economic trees seedlings will be supplied at no cost to the affected farmers.
Mr Aidoo stressed that no chemical can treat an infected cocoa tree unless it is cut and replanted.
He said the youth in the farming communities have been engaged in the replanting exercise to create employment for them.
