By Loretta B Manele
Producing cocoa until you reach that standard quality of cocoa you want needs a little bit of patience.
Patrick Mesia, is the project manager for Sol Cocoa Livelihood project in which ADRA (Adventist Development and Relief Agency) in Solomon Islands is carrying out in communities in Guadalcanal, Makira and Western provinces with funding support from ADRA Australia.
Recently, Mesia and his team joined the World Food Day celebrations which was held late last month.
Students and passer byers were interested to see the display of cocoa beans at the stall and listen to one of the guys at the stall talk about cocoa.
Meanwhile, Mesia happily agreed to chat with the media and told us about the project he is heading.
The project is being piloted in 7 communities and they want to replicate the best practice produced from this 3-year project in other communities.
Like any project that involves planting, they start from the nursery stage where they look for the best varieties of cocoa for farmers to grow.
Farmers are also assisted to carry out proper management until the cocoa trees bear fruit.
“We also train them how to ferment and dry to produce quality cocoa and we lead them to a boutique market”
Mesia pointed out that it is not a bulk market where you get small or under-quality beans but rather a high-end market.
He added that the income received from the project goes towards savings for women which is another component of the project.
“So, income that we are receiving is managed so families can benefit from it”
To top that off, the project is also involved in the downstream process so they are also producing chocolate.
Mesia expressed that they are linking farmers from the cocoa tree to what is normally processed from the cocoa fruit.
From his perspective, this link is important because it is not until farmers look at it and realize that it’s something to eat that they will worry about the quantity.
“So, we found that linking the trees to the end product is a helpful project”
In any accomplishment or project there are bound to be some bumpy rides along the way, which we normally refer to as “challenges”.
Mesia continues on to talk about several challenges they’ve encountered while carrying out this project.
He said there were a lot of challenges and one of them is leading farmers to the quality of the product which as he stressed, needs a little bit of patience.
So, what happens is, the farmers produce their first batch of cocoa and bring it in for testing with the help of CEMA.
After it’s been tested, Mesia and his team will give farmers feedback.
He reiterated that this step needs more patience from the farmers because they’ll have to keep going until the quality of cocoa is consistent and this is when they are told that they are on the right path or as he puts it “are doing okay”.
The “drying process” is also another challenge, particularly when it rains throughout the whole week.
Mesia said the process works better if you have a lot of good sunshine.
If not, they will try to be innovative and use heaters however this will be for the next phase of the project.
“So, if it rains for a week, we can use heating elements for drying”
Efficient access by means of travel poses as another challenge.
Some of the roads leading to some of the communities inland are difficult to travel on hence the government should assist in the improvement of roads so farmers can travel easily when they bring in their products.
Mesia said farmers struggle when travelling to bring their products to them.
Teamwork was the fourth challenge mentioned.
For most of the communities, Mesia found that working together in a team is a little bit challenging because the people in those communities like to work individually.
“We are trying to work in groups of farmers, we call them micro lots of farmers. Like five farmers work together and have one central processing unit so that everyone comes together in one unit”
Mesia said that you can only maximize quality of your product to maintain that quality if you work in micro lots or in groups rather than individually.
“This is because one farmer may reach the quality we want and the rest may struggle so we want them to work in groups”
Last but not the least, there is the challenge of future farming practices in terms of planting cocoa which must go in line with the EU Deforest regulation which is to not cut down forests before planting.
Mesai said this is a big challenge for them because the normal practice of farming is to cut down trees or forests before planting.
“But with that EU regulation, if we don’t follow it, we don’t access the EU markets. So, in doing that, we will try to make an integrated farming approach. That means planting some fruit trees, some cocoa trees, some local varieties. So, you have a more integrated agroforestry approach. That’s the future going forward”
On the other hand, Mesia said they have actually opened a boutique market for them in New Zealand.
“Just for information, in the last few weeks sixteen overseas chocolate makers from the UK and Europe came following a story about quality beans”
He mentioned that when they are producing the quality, the demand is already there from overseas.
“The challenge now is we might not have enough to supply all the interest outside so that’s why we need to replicate in many more communities so that we meet that volume of supply”
Mesia said that now that they have a market outside, going forward they are thinking of expanding to other provinces like Makira, Russell Islands and Isabel.
He stated that they would be very happy if they could expand to other provinces because you never know there maybe something nice out there like unique flavours of cocoa from other provinces.
