The production of perennial export crops like cocoa and coffee have risen substantially. Thus, cocoa production has reached 230000 tons.
In this area, Sodécao, a State-owned corporation responsible for promoting this crop, presented the accomplishments made during the Ebolowa Show, and its action programme in terms of intensifying the selected nurseries, opening evacuation routes and organizing rural markets. In 2010, coffee, a traditional Cameroonian crop, registered a production of 50000 tons for robusta coffee and 12000 tons for Arabica coffee. The government has set itself the objective of attaining a production of 125000 tons of coffee in 2015 and raising the processing rate to close to 40% to step up the added value of Cameroonian exports in this sector. A few measures have thus been envisaged: developing qualitative and quantitative production; promoting local processing; developing special coffees like the gourmet robusta, which has become increasingly popular; promoting local consumption.
These measures are buttressed by government funding through various organizations such as the Coffee and Cocoa Development Fund, or the Cocoa-Coffee Orchard Protection Programme.
The growth registered by industrial crops – cotton, oil palm, rubber, sugar cane and dessert banana – which fall both under agriculture and agro-industry, is generally high. For oil palms, for example, the palm groves produced 124 691 tons in 2010, i.e. a 13% growth compared to 2009. This increase is due to the progressive start of production of new agro industrial and village plantations and the improvement of the production tool. Besides, following the world crisis in 2010, rubber production rose by 21.1% to reach 53 433 tons.