Cocoa Production and Distribution in Bahia (Brazil) after the Witch’s Broom

Abstract

Theobroma cacao production in the state of Bahia (Brazil) suffered crises due to a combination of falling prices, the end of subsidized credit, droughts, international supply and witches’ broom disease. The objective was to verify the distribution of the cocoa crop in the state of Bahia and to analyze the indicators of harvested area, production and productivity, starting from the crop crisis that started in the late 1980s. Data were collected from the Brazilian Institute of Geography database. and Statistics, period from 1988 to 2019. Cocoa production is present in 26% of the municipalities, distributed in nine economic regions, especially in the east of the state. Harvested area decreased by 30.7%, production by 65.4% and productivity by 50.1%; numbers that demonstrate the dimension of the problem. In the economic regions, there was a separation of two periods: 1988–1999 and 2000–2019. In the first, the indicators show higher numbers that decrease with the deepening of the crisis. In the second, cultivars resistant to witches’ broom and new management and production techniques were implanted, measures related to the behavior of the indicators. Thus, decades after the cocoa farming crisis, increasing production and productivity levels remains a challenge.