By Awyetu Asabe Hope
Nigeria’s cocoa bean exports to the United States rose by 554 per cent to $142m in 2025, up from $21.7m in 2024, according to the United States Mission in Nigeria.
The mission disclosed the figures in a social media post on Tuesday, October 20, 2026, highlighting the growing international demand for Nigerian cocoa and its potential to boost the country’s foreign exchange earnings.
“This is just to US, we have not talked about Europe, China, India etc. Nigeria is rising, position yourself appropriately,” the mission stated.
The development comes amid the Federal Government’s renewed efforts to promote local cocoa processing, industrialisation and value addition.
In July, President Bola Tinubu announced plans to end the export of raw cocoa beans, arguing that Nigeria should process more of its agricultural produce locally rather than export raw materials and import finished products.
Represented by the Minister of Agriculture and Food Security, Abubakar Kyari, at the Cocoa Value Addition Summit 2026 in Abuja, Tinubu reiterated the government’s commitment to strengthening the cocoa value chain through domestic processing and manufacturing.
The summit, themed ‘From Bean to Brand: The Bean in My Hand, The Brand in Our Future’, brought together ministers, state governors, development partners, financiers, cocoa-producing countries and other industry stakeholders to develop a roadmap for Africa’s cocoa industry.
Speaking at the event, Kyari said Africa produces about 70 per cent of the world’s cocoa but captures only a small share of the more than $130bn global chocolate industry.
He attributed the disparity to the concentration of processing, branding and manufacturing outside the continent, leaving cocoa-producing countries with limited economic benefits despite their significant contribution to global supply.
Kyari said the government’s push for local value addition aims to reverse the trend by ensuring that more of the wealth generated from cocoa production and processing remains in Nigeria.
