COCOBOD’s Unrealised Potential: Promoting Human Rights, Welfare, and the Environment in Ghana’s Cocoa-growing communities

June 2021

In 2019, Ghana received a USD 600 million syndicated loan from the African Development Bank and other private lenders to maximize cocoa production and improve farmers’ livelihoods. As a prerequisite for obtaining the loan, COCOBOD, the government agency that runs Ghana’s cocoa industry, established an Environmental and Social Management System (ESMS) with a grievance and redress mechanism. The ESMS aims to identify and manage environmental and social risks and opportunities to protect the environment and improve the livelihoods of cocoa farmers and others in Ghana’s cocoa sector. 

This report examines COCOBOD’s ESMS and its component grievance and redress mechanism, finding that the grievance and redress mechanism could be a powerful tool for cocoa farmers, workers, and their communities. However, the ESMS and its grievance and redress mechanism remain unfulfilled promises.

This report is the product of a collaboration between the Northwestern Pritzker School of Law’s Center for International Human Rights, the University of Ghana School of Law, Corporate Accountability Lab, SEND Ghana, Barima Akwasi Amankwaah of the Ghana NGO Coalition on the Rights of the Child (GNCRC), and Glen Asomaning of Nature and Development Foundation (NDF). 

On June 17, 2021, CAL participated in a webinar on the launch of this report. The recording is viewable here.