By Ademola Adekusibe
President Bola Tinubu has declared that Nigeria will no longer export raw cocoa beans, unveiling an ambitious plan to transform the country’s cocoa industry through local processing, industrialisation, and value addition.
Speaking at the Cocoa Value Addition Summit 2026 in Abuja, represented by the Minister of Agriculture and Food Security, Senator Abubakar Kyari, the President declared: “Nigeria will no longer export raw beans while importing finished value. We will grind our beans at home, we will press our butter at home, we will make our chocolate at home, brand it at home, and sell it to the world on our own terms”.
Tinubu noted that although Africa produces about 70 per cent of the world’s cocoa, the continent earns only a tiny fraction of the over $130 billion global chocolate industry because processing, branding, and manufacturing take place overseas.
The President highlighted ongoing investments, including a 70,000-tonne cocoa processing facility being built in Sagamu, Ogun State, which he described as the largest in Nigeria’s history. He also noted that Nigeria’s national grinding capacity has crossed 120,000 tons annually.
More than 300,000 Nigerian farming families cultivate cocoa across over 1.4 million hectares, making the country one of the world’s leading producers with about 6 to 7 per cent of global output. Cocoa generated more than N3 trillion in export earnings when global prices exceeded $10,000 per tonne, contributing almost a quarter of Nigeria’s non-oil exports.
The summit also saw the signing of the Abuja Declaration, forming an alliance between Nigeria, Ghana, Côte d’Ivoire, and Cameroon – countries that control about 75 per cent of global cocoa production – to negotiate with international buyers as a single bloc.
The Federal Government, cocoa-producing states, farmers, processors, and financiers also signed Nigeria’s national compact on cocoa value addition under the Cocoa Value Addition Accord framework.
The Bank of Industry, which co-convened the summit, announced dedicated financing windows for cocoa processing, ingredient manufacturing, packaging, and chocolate production.