Asymmetry and transmission of international price shocks of cocoa and coffee in Togo

Abstract

This study assesses the mechanism of the transmission of international price shocks to producer prices of coffee and cocoa in Togo. A threshold autoregressive (TAR) model was estimated using monthly series of international and producer prices of coffee and cocoa in Togo from 1994 to 2018. The results show that there is asymmetric transmission of international price shocks to producer prices. Domestic prices respond less quickly to international price increase than decreases. The asymmetric price transmission is similar in term of the speed of adjustment for the two commodities. In order to deal with this phenomenon, further investigations need to be done to detect the reasons for the asymmetry in price transmission between domestic and international coffee and cocoa markets.