Sustainability performance of organic and conventional cocoa farming systems in Atwima Mponua District of Ghana

The potential of organic agriculture to contribute to sustainable development in Ghana is unclear. This article assesses the sustainability performance of organic and conventional cocoa farming systems in Ghana. Data was collected from 398 organic and conventional cocoa farmers using the SMART-Farm tool. Compared to conventional cocoa farming systems, we found a higher environmental sustainability performance in organic cocoa farming systems regarding water withdrawal (+29%), species diversity (+26%), land degradation (+24%), genetic diversity (+24%) and greenhouse gases (+22%). The organic farming systems performed better compared to conventional in profitability (+20%) due to market premiums, gender equity (+27%), and verbally committed to sustainability topics (+25%). Agronomic practices had a strong influence on the observed sustainability performance, especially the environmental performance. Typical organic cocoa farming system has small farm sizes, spends more hours weeding manually since chemical weedicides are prohibited and has more diverse crops. Measures to improve performance is paramount for farming systems sustainability.

Automated summary

The research found that organic cocoa farming systems in Ghana perform better in terms of environmental sustainability compared to conventional systems, and also have advantages in terms of economic, social, and environmental aspects. Organic farming systems have smaller farm sizes, require more manual labor, and are more diverse in crop cultivation.