Coulibaly told the Abidjan meeting on sustainable cocoa production that part of the problem lay in "the small part producers play in the stages of transformation" of cocoa beans into their end products.

This means that they were not getting a fair share of the 'value-added' to their crop, he said.

Coulibaly said world cocoa production in the current 2008/09 crop year could fall by to 100,000 tonnes from 3.7 million tonnes in 2007/09.

Countries were being hurt by "poor returns for African producers and a drop in quality on the international market" but production was also down because of damage to the environment and to cultivable land, he said.

On the continent, there are between five and six million cocoa farmers.

The meeting in Ivory Coast's economic capital is due to last until Thursday and delegates will draw up resolutions for another meeting to hosted by Trinidad and Tobago in the Caribbean in March.

The Abidjan meeting was organised by the Ivory Coast, the world's single largest producter, and is being attended by Jan Vingerhoets, executive director of the International Cocoa Organisation.

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