Cocoa pods grow on a farm hit by swollen shoot disease in Osino in the Eastern Region, Ghana, February 27, 2024. In its most sobering assessment to date, according to data compiled since 2018 and obtained exclusively by Reuters, Ghana’s cocoa marketing board Cocobod estimates that 590,000 hectares of plantations have been infected with swollen shoot, a virus that will ultimately kill them. Once infected with swollen shoot, plantations must be ripped out and the soil treated before cocoa can be replanted. REUTERS/Francis Kokoroko
