Cocoa-bean shipments from Indonesia’s main growing provinces on Sulawesi island slumped 86 percent in April from a month earlier as exporters delayed sales to benefit from lower tax and as bad weather reduced supplies.
Exports from Central and South Sulawesi provinces fell to 1,570 metric tons last month from 10,957 tons in March, according to data from the Indonesian Cocoa Association released today. Sales were 5,715 tons in April last year.
Lower export duties may help “increase shipments in May,” Dakhri Sanusi, secretary general of the group, known as Askindo, said in a telephone interview today from Makassar, South Sulawesi. Still, “there’s a concern that output may decline due to bad weather and reducing supplies of beans.”
Falling supplies from the world’s third-largest grower of the chocolate ingredient, which harvests most of its crop from April to July, may help to sustain gains in prices, which have risen about 10 percent this year amid a political crisis in Ivory Coast, the world’s top producer.
The Indonesian government cut the tax on exports of the commodity to 10 percent in May from 15 percent last month following a decline in prices, Deddy Saleh, director general of foreign trade at the Trade Ministry, said on April 21.
Shipments from Sulawesi, which accounts for about three- quarters of Indonesia’s sales and output, dropped 47 percent in the first four months of the year to 34,033 tons, the association said.
Cocoa for July delivery rose 1.8 percent to close at $3,340 a ton on the ICE Futures U.S. in New York on April 29.
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