The Ghana Cocoa Board (COCOBOD) has hinted on its collaboration with the Ghana Academy of Arts and Science (GAAS) to conduct extensive research into the use of cocoa in the treatment of some global life-threatening diseases.
According to a release, the team up between GAAS and COCOBOD is also to enhance a deeper and closer collaboration to further stimulate the agenda of encouraging the consumption of cocoa due to its enormous health and nutritional benefit.
The research as stated will focus on how cocoa can help manage cardiovascular disease such as hypertension, diabetes, high and low-density lipoprotein cholesterol, overweight or obesity and thrombosis.
Explaining further on the collaboration, the president of GAAS, Emeritus Sefa Dede said, the collaboration would help promote research and development and also discover ways to address some challenges hampering Ghana’s industrialization and economic expansion.
“GAAS gives its commitment to this collaboration to bring urgently needed relief to our people”, he said.
He added that, the partnership between the two; science and industry will extend to business, considering that the multibillion-dollar cocoa chocolate industry is estimated at US $120b. But Africa, the largest global producer earns only about 5%.
The Chief Executive Officer of Ghana Cocoa Board (COCOBOD), Joseph Boahen Aidoo, emphasized that cocoa as an integral ingredient in the confectionery and cosmetics industries must be looked at critically.
He also believed that in the era of innovation, there must be the need to empirical fact to support claims regarding the health properties of cocoa.
Meanwhile, per the statement, the joint initiative between the GAAS and COCOBOD is expected to make a business case for increased consumption of cocoa not only in Ghana but also the West African Sub-region.
