Johanna HARLE

Johanna did her internship at the LSCE on an issue focused on the impact of climate change on cocoa production. Ivory Coast and Ghana are the two largest producers of cocoa in the world (53% of world production). Cocoa represents 7.5 and 3.4% of their Gross Domestic Product respectively and is a very important source of income for the rural population of these two countries. Climate change by affecting the region’s climatic conditions currently favorable to cocoa production could have a big impact on the population, the economy of these two countries and on the world cocoa production. The objective of this study is to look at the evolution of climate indicators relevant to cocoa (in particular an annual precipitation greater than 1200 mm / year, less than 3 consecutive months receiving less than 100 mm / month) by 2050 to explore the risks that could threaten cocoa production in the future. To do so we used RCP8.5 simulations from the CORDEX Africa model ensemble. Three types of models are highlighted : models where the annual precipitation increases in the future, models where it decreases and models without any trend. For models with significant changes in precipitation, 63% of those changes are recorded during the rainy season. In the future, models predict a decrease in consecutive dry days of 30%, an homogeneous increase in monthly temperatures all through the year and an average annual precipitation greater than what the cocoa needs, favorable to the maintenance of cocoa cultivation in the region. However, an increase in extreme daily temperatures as well as extreme precipitation is also predicted which is not conducive to cocoa cultivation.s