Abidjan, Nov. 12 - U.S.-Dutch agribusiness giant Cargill Inc. will on Nov. 16 open its third cocoa purchasing station inside Ivory Coast's cocoa belt, a person inside the company told Dow Jones Newswires.
The new buying station is located in Soubre, the main town in the key southwestern cocoa growing area of Bas-Sassandra, which produces about 25% of Ivory Coast's average annual crop of around 1.3 million metric tons.
Cargill is the country's leading cocoa exporter.
Last season the company exported almost 232,000 tons of cocoa, or more than 19% of total exports.
Cargill already has buying stations in the center-west cocoa towns of Gagnoa and Daloa, cocoa terminals in the ports of Abidjan and San Pedro and a 100,000 tons a year cocoa grinding plant in Abidjan.