Most researchers defend cocoa agroforests as a model, which guarantees sustainable cocoa production while protecting biodiversity. However, in most countries, farmers’ strategies favour “full sun” cocoa farms, close to the concept of monoculture. Why this apparent paradox? Field surveys were conducted in 2005 and 2008 with 180 migrant and autochthon farmers in four districts of Ghana, including some measurements at the farm plot level and satellite images in a fifth district. An analytical grid shows how factors interact. Adoption of sun-loving hybrids; farmers’ negative perception of ecological services in relation to hybrids; legislation excluding smallholders from the legal timber market; recent expansion of the timber industry; and the migratory phenomenon. Most smallholders consider complex cocoa agroforests as a thing of the past. They were designed at a time when land and forests were abundant. The future of cocoa and timber may lie in ‘light commercial-oriented agroforests’ or a kind of mosaic landscape.

Cocoa farming has been a major driver of deforestation in West Africa, notably in Côte d'Ivoire, the world's leading cocoa producer. Cocoa has been a "pioneer crop" that was grown after forest clearing, and instead of replanting aging plantations, farmers usually migrated to the forest frontiers to establish a new cocoa farm. During the second half of the twentieth century, the cocoa frontier moved from the drier east to the wetter southwest of the country, fueled by massive immigration of prospective cocoa farmers from the savanna. It has been argued that the climate gradient was a major driver of these east-west migrations and that cocoa farmers, by replacing forest with farm land over vast areas, contributed to the further drying of the climate in a positive feedback cycle. If this were the case, then a hotter and drier future climate would likely continue to push cocoa farmers into the wetter southwest of the sub-continent, with the last forest reserves of southwestern Côte d'Ivoire and Liberia as the only remaining destinations. Based on an analysis of long-term rainfall measurements in major cocoa growing areas of Côte d'Ivoire and interviews with cocoa farmers about their history and motives of migration, we argue that climate and drought have been supporting factors, but not usually the main drivers of cocoa migrations, which were mostly a response to the perceived availability of forest land for planting. We also show that the observed decrease in rainfall in the cocoa regions during the 1970s and 1980s was not primarily a response to local deforestation related to cocoa farming, although deforestation may have caused microclimatic changes. Climate extremes like the 1982/3 drought have also triggered adaptations of farming practices like replanting and crop diversification. To prevent cocoa farming from continuing to act as a driver of deforestation in a hotter climate, governments and supply chain actors should discourage forest frontier dynamics and should help cocoa farmers adapt to environmental change by adopting more intensive and diversified farming practices, building on farmers' own risk mitigation and adaptation strategies. (Résumé d'auteur

Many tree crop farms in the tropics are in a process of crop diversification, even in regions that have traditionally been dominated by a single tree crop species. Here, we review the factors that drive diversification and that influence farmer choices. We analyze recent literature from tropical Latin America, Africa, Asia, and the Pacific Islands, with emphasis on West and Central Africa. We use a framework that distinguishes farmer objectives in diversifying; the opportunities and constraints caused by environmental, technological, market, and policy factors; and farmer characteristics. Our main findings are: (1) Farmers diversify to increase their income by adding more lucrative crops. They diversify also to spread their income to lean times between the harvests of their traditional crops. In addition, farmers diversify to maintain or increase their food security especially while young tree crops are maturing and to reduce their vulnerability to environmental, market, and policy shocks. (2) Famers take advantage of opportunities and are subject to constraints. These include: heterogeneous site characteristics; the legacy of previous forest vegetation; emergent market opportunities from growing urban centers; a diversity of products and market outlets for some crops that reduces marketing risks; government policies; labor constraints that favor certain crops; the availability of investment capital that influences particularly the timing of diversification decisions; and access to improved planting material. (3) Diversification decisions also depend on farmer characteristics such as their age, education, financial situation, and farm and family size. Young farmers are not always more active in diversification than older farmers, although diversification and crop change are often related to generational change. Returning urban migrants have often had a positive effect in terms of diversification and innovation. (4) Diversification is often a response to structural environmental degradation caused by decades of tree crop monocultures. We conclude with a list of areas where government and non-government organizations can support farmers in their diversification decisions. (Résumé d'auteur

This paper is based on farm surveys and historical reviews of regional cocoa cycles conducted in 1980-1985 and 1997/98 in Côte d'Ivoire and in 1989-1999 in Sulawesi (Indonesia). A qualitative model of cocoa cycles is presented. The adoption of cocoa and new manual techniques of forest clearing and planting in Côte d'Ivoire, and the adoption of chainsaws and herbicides and the impact of green revolution in Sulawesi are discussed. Features of the main technical changes studied in the two areas are tabulated. The cases of Côte d'Ivoire and Sulawesi showed that lack of formal (statutory) property rights does not necessarily deter short- and medium-term investments in cocoa orchards. In an increasingly risky social environment, however, more secure land tenure may facilitate longer-term investments, such as replanting cocoa with timber trees.