Nigeria produces more than 300,000 metric tonnes of cocoa each year, yet only about 50,000 tonnes are processed locally. Closing that gap is central to the country's ambition of earning more from one of its most valuable agricultural commodities.
That ambition has received fresh momentum with a €60 million credit facility secured by the Bank of Industry (BOI) from the European Investment Bank (EIB). The funding will support cocoa processing, ingredient manufacturing, packaging and chocolate production, helping expand local value addition and strengthen Nigeria's industrial capacity.
BOI Managing Director, Olasupo Olusi, announced the facility at the Cocoa Value Addition Summit in Abuja, themed From Bean to Brand.
According to Olusi, the financing forms part of BOI's strategy to mobilise blended and concessional funding for the cocoa sector while easing the high cost of capital that has constrained indigenous processors.
"An example of this is the €60 million credit facility we received from the European Investment Bank to develop the cocoa sector," he said, noting that it would help Nigerian processors compete more fairly with multinational companies that enjoy cheaper financing.
Beyond the new facility, BOI plans to establish dedicated financing windows for cocoa processing, ingredient manufacturing, packaging and chocolate production. The bank is also exploring the creation of a Cocoa Value Addition Park in Nigeria's cocoa-producing belt, featuring shared processing facilities, quality laboratories, reliable power supply, effluent treatment systems and digital traceability infrastructure.
"We are not approaching cocoa as a lending programme; we are building an industrial ecosystem," Olusi said.
He explained that BOI's goal is to finance the entire cocoa value chain from nurseries and cooperatives to grinding plants, ingredient factories, packaging lines and chocolate manufacturers.
Olusi also stressed that financing must reflect the realities of the industry. Cocoa replanting requires grace periods of three to five years, while processing plants need long-term capital of seven to 10 years, financing that commercial banks rarely provide.
The bank has already expanded its support for agro-industrial development. In 2025, BOI disbursed more than ₦164 billion to over 3,500 agro-processing and food businesses, supporting factories, mills, packhouses and cold-chain projects while integrating nearly 48,000 smallholder farmers into industrial value chains.
Olusi said expanding local processing capacity could increase Nigeria's cocoa export value by between two and four times. It would also drive industrialisation, create jobs, reduce dependence on raw bean exports, encourage local cocoa powder production and promote exports of cocoa butter and cocoa liquor to ECOWAS countries and the Gulf region.
"For at the Bank of Industry, we are not in the business of financing commodities. We are in the business of financing value creation," he said.
Speaking at the summit, Chris Isokpunwu, Permanent Secretary of the Federal Ministry of Industry, Trade and Investment, represented by Mohammed Bala, Director of Industrial Development, said more than 80 percent of Nigeria's cocoa is still exported as raw beans despite the country's processing potential. Expanding domestic processing, he noted, would boost export earnings, create jobs and strengthen downstream industries such as confectionery, cosmetics and pharmaceuticals.
Ransford Abbey, Chief Executive of the Ghana Cocoa Board (COCOBOD), said Africa produces about 75 percent of the world's cocoa but earns less than 10 percent of the value generated by the global chocolate industry.
"This system cannot continue. We must shift the paradigm from exporting raw poverty to creating refined wealth right here on the African continent," he said.
Massino Deluko, representing the European Union, reaffirmed the bloc's support for cocoa value addition and called on governments to provide the policy and regulatory framework needed to attract greater investment into the sector.
The €60 million EIB facility marks another important step in Nigeria's efforts to build a stronger cocoa processing industry. By expanding local manufacturing and encouraging greater value addition, the initiative has the potential to create more jobs, increase export earnings and position Nigeria to capture a larger share of the global cocoa economy.
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