The Quality Control Division of the Ghana Cocoa Board (COCOBOD) has advised cocoa farmers to ensure adequate fermentation and drying of their cocoa beans, before sales in order to help to protect the premium quality of the country's cocoa. Mr Kwadwo Kyei, Principal Quality Control Officer, gave the advice when he interacted with farmers on the quality of cocoa beans at Akim Oda in the Eastern Region. Mr Kyei stated that the purple colour of some of the beans is as a result of bad fermentation and advised that the only way they could avoid a recurrence was to ferment the beans properly. According to him, the beans must be fermented very well for six days, before putting them on the drying mat. This is to ensure that they are thoroughly dried before bagging. Mr Kyei urged Purchasing Clerks to do pre-sale inspection to ensure that the beans do not contain any foreign matter before they purchased the beans. The Principal Officer was not happy about farmers using child labour on their cocoa farms and cautioned them against the practice and asked them to desist from using children without allowing them to go to school. Mr Kyei advised the farmers to accept only Akuafo Cheques whenever they sold their cocoa to the Purchasing Clerks and reminded them of the numerous benefits that they could derive from that. He urged the P/Cs to stop pre-financing the purchase of cocoa, a practice, which he described as having brought untold hardships to some of the farmers. Source: GNA