Cocoa farming is central to the livelihoods of 800,000 farm families in Ghana, but as climate change intensifies, cocoa farmers have come under tremendous pressure to look for new ways to adapt to the challenges that climate change brings. From erratic rainfall and prolonged dry spells to soil degradation, these environmental challenges threaten the sustainability of cocoa production and the farmers who depend on it.
Asaase Pa Food Systems Limited, is a rural service center established with support from Solidaridad in 2020 to provide essential farm management services to cocoa farmers. Today, Asaase Pa is leading the way in addressing these environmental challenges stemming from climate change through the production and use of biochar, a climate-smart soil amendment that enhances soil health to boost farm productivity.
Biochar spread around the base of a cocoa tree and worked into the ground balances soil PH, increases porosity leading to better aeration and water retention, increases nutrient retention, contributes to carbon sequestration, and improves crop yields.
In partnership with Tachibana International Ghana Company, a cocoa and ingredients trading company and the organization Planboo, Asaase Pa is converting waste from the processing of cocoa pods into biochar, which balances soil PH, increases porosity leading to better aeration and water retention, increases nutrient retention, contributes to carbon sequestration, and improves crop yields.
“I took 300 bags of biochar from Asaase Pa and applied [them] on my 4-hectare cocoa farm. I noticed a remarkable improvement in soil quality and crop resilience. Even during the dry periods this year, there was still moisture in the soil, which kept my trees fresh and healthy”Francis Maxwell Oppong, a cocoa farmer in Nkonya in the Western region of Ghana.
Foster Makafui Tattrah of Asaase Pa recounts how the biochar initiative first began to the current point of providing biochar to over 500 farmers for free.
“We discovered biochar online and reached out to Tachibana, who introduced us to a grant opportunity for a pilot project. The success of that pilot has now led us to open two additional biochar production centers.”
Foster Makafui Tattrah (right) with a colleague from Asaase Pa
This collaboration enabled Tachibana and Planboo to access carbon markets in Europe for the carbon removed through biochar production. To date the project has successfully sold 42 metric tonnes CO₂equivalent on carbon markets and paid more than 4,000 dollars to Asaase Pa. Tachibana is a Certified C-Sink Manager with the capacity to scale biochar projects.
Growing need, growing demand for Biochar
Looking ahead, Asaase Pa plans to scale up its biochar production. It envisions establishing 25 biochar centers across cocoa landscapes in Ghana over the next five years while continuing to offer sustainable solutions to our farmers.
“By integrating innovative solutions like biochar into the cocoa value chain, Asaase Pa and its partners are not only improving the sustainability of cocoa farming but also creating long-term economic opportunities for farmers,” says Hammond Mensah, Cocoa Lead for Solidaridad West Africa.
“The Rural Service Centers remain a vital part of this transformation, proving that with the right support, cocoa farming can be both profitable and sustainable.”
Workers prepare biochar to be delivered to farmers.
This is a piece of our running series of updates directly from our biochar project partners, written from their own experiences and in their own words. Today, we hear from Kekeli and the Tachibana team who are turning cacao pods into biochar in Central Ghana.
April 2025 Kekeli Bright Klu, Internal Inspector, Tachibana:
In recent years, cacao production in Ghana has been declining year by year due to climate change, the spread of pests and diseases, rising fertilizer costs, and soil degradation. In response to this issue, we began exploring whether cacao farmers could increase their yields by carbonizing and utilizing cacao pods, an underutilized biomass readily available to them.
Through this initiative, we realized that the cost of producing biochar was a major challenge to its sustainable production and use, which led us to consider the creation of carbon credits. In 2023, with the support of Japan’s Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry (METI), we conducted a feasibility study on the production of cacao pod husk biochar and the generation of carbon credits.
Planboo supported us not only as a technical partner for dMRV (digital Monitoring, Reporting, and Verification) but also in building a viable business model. During the pilot, the Tachibana biochar project successfully produced, and generated, biochar carbon removal credits, becoming Ghana’s first C-Sink Manager under the Global Artisan C-Sink Standard.
In May 2024, our first carbon credits—equivalent to 42 t-CO2eq—were successfully certified and sold through Planboo. Following this success, we expanded our operations by adding two more biochar production sites, increasing the number of Kon Tiki kilns to four, and growing the number of production workers to 21.
Following the success of biochar production at our first 3 sites, we’ve been able to onboard a cacao farmers cooperative union, the Assin Tachibana Union, representing 1,700 cacao farmers. This Union project has already passed certification and an external third-party audit, and is set to begin operations in April of this year.
Researching Biochar’s Benefits for Cacao Farming Communities
In August 2023, we registered an NGO called EN FARMERS LBG, with the mission of supporting cacao farmers by improving their productivity and living conditions. To enable more cacao farmers to benefit from soil improvement and increased yields through the use of biochar, we are engaging in discussions with the Japanese government, international organizations, Japanese chocolate manufacturers, and international NGOs to expand our activities more broadly.
As part of this project, we also plan to establish demonstration plots to measure the impact of biochar on cacao production and to develop a biochar application manual for cacao farmers. Since cacao is a perennial tree crop and its response to biochar takes time to manifest, we also plan to create demo plots for vegetables and grains, which show results more quickly, allowing farmers to directly experience the benefits of biochar in the short term.
These field trials will be conducted with the involvement of experts, including a professor specializing in biochar from Japanese university, a professor from Ghana’s Cacao College, and soil scientists with PhDs, to ensure the collection of academically reliable data and the development of practical, science-based manuals.
Through these efforts, we aim to make biochar a familiar and accessible agricultural input for cacao farmers—one that not only improves soil health but also contributes to climate change mitigation. Our goal is to build and scale a sustainable model that benefits both people and the planet.
Looking Ahead
Since it has only been about two years since we began our initiatives in biochar production and carbon credit generation, we continue to face a variety of unexpected challenges on a daily basis. We are constantly working to improve our operations and business model. There is still much we cannot accomplish on our own, and we believe that we would not have been able to continue this biochar initiative without the dedicated support and encouragement of Planboo’s professional team.
The staff at Planboo have been incredibly collaborative, and their dMRV technology continues to evolve and improve, providing us with the confidence and tools we need to generate high-quality carbon credits. We are deeply grateful for the support of the Planboo team.
Fortunately, we are seeing an increase in the number of companies and organizations that share our vision and support our efforts. With their collaboration, we aim to further promote the use of biochar throughout Ghana.
From a rural corner of Ghana, we are striving to contribute to the global fight against climate change through biochar. We hope you will continue to support and encourage our journey.
