Cameroon cocoa production slips 8% in 2013/14 season

* Officials had been expecting output to increase

* Decline blamed on extended rainy season, disease


* Port congestion remains major problem


Cameroon's 2013/14 cocoa production slipped more than 8 percent to 209,905 tonnes compared with 228,948 tonnes the previous season, National Cocoa and Coffee Board (NCCB) data obtained on Friday showed.


Cocoa bean exports from the world's fifth largest producer fell nearly 20 percent to 158,000 tonnes from 196,788 tonnes in the 2012/13 season. There were 5,828 tonnes of remaining stocks of beans at the end of the season on July 31.


"We had expected that there would be an increase in production for the 2013/14 season to about 240,000 tonnes, but unfortunately it instead declined," Omer Gatien Maledy, head of the Cocoa and Coffee Inter-professional Board (CCIB), said.

Maledy said poor weather was mainly to blame for the drop in output.


"The rainy season last year was very different from what Cameroon is used to, going on until mid-December and resulting in the black pod disease," he said.


According to the NCCB's managing director Michael Ndoping, 77 percent of the exports were shipped by the top five exporters - Telcar Cocoa Ltd, Olam Cam, Cameroon Marketing Commodities, Ets Ndongo Essomba and PRODUCAM.


Nearly 66 percent of exports were destined for the Netherlands, followed by Belgium with 10.6 percent and Malaysia with 10.4 percent.


The season was characterised by serious blockages at the port of Douala, which Maledy said remained one of the main issues requiring a solution heading into the new 2014/15 season.

"The delays caused by congestion heavily penalised exporters who constantly had to renegotiate their agreements with foreign clients and got it in the neck," he said.


The backlogs also caused the quality of beans, packed into containers for weeks, to deteriorate, he added.


A total of 32,804 tonnes of beans were processed domestically, the vast majority by Sic-Cacaos, a subsidiary of Swiss chocolate manufacturing firm Barry Callebaut, and CHOCOCAM, an affiliate of South Africa's Tiger Brands.


Cameroon's cocoa production hit a record of 240,000 tonnes in the 2010/11 season before dropping to 220,000 tonnes in 2011/12 due to a prolonged dry season and attacks by pests and diseases.