Volatility and stabilization of the price of coffee and cocoa in Côte d'Ivoire

Abstract

The aim of this paper was to study the coffee and cocoa price volatility in Côte d’Ivoire and to understand the mechanism of price stabilization. Thus, this paper shows that the international prices and the farm gate prices of these two products are strongly dispersed around their respective average, from one year to another and within each year. This paper proposes a model of partial stabilization which makes it possible to highlight an alternate mechanism of the coffee and cocoa price stabilization which is relatively efficient compared to the mechanism which currently exists. It shows that a marketing board in the Ivorian coffee and cocoa sector, which constitutes a buffer stock and uses it in a strategic way, has the advantage of reducing significantly the volatility of the international price and the farm gate price.