Create a direct bridge between the province of Ragusa and the Ivory Coast to bring the cocoa beans directly to the laboratories of the master chocolatiers of Modica with the possibility of setting up a plant for the production of bitter cocoa paste in the Iblean municipality. But not only. Because the possibilities for collaboration put on the table today on the occasion of the meeting held at the Sicindustria Ragusa headquarters between the industrialists of the province led by President Giorgio Cappello and the Ivory Coast Delegation were truly many.
“Our objective – said Cappello – is to facilitate any action that can lead to shortening the supply chain of raw materials, both with regard to the cocoa beans used by the artisan master chocolatiers of the Modica Chocolate Protection Consortium, and as regards those of coffee used by our associated industrial processing companies. Today, interesting possibilities have emerged that we intend to fully exploit.”
Starting from the cocoa sector where we are witnessing a surge in supply prices following the lower supply capacity of Ivory Coast and Ghana, countries which alone represent around 70% of world production. For this reason, the Consortium for the Protection of Chocolate of Modica has proposed to implement the “Pasta Amara Modica” project, developed by the director of the Consortium for the Protection of Chocolate of Modica, Nino Scivoletto, and by Davide Guarnaccia, scientific director of the nutraceutical sector of the Laerbium and expert in cocoa and chocolate, which involves the production of bitter cocoa paste in a plant located in the Modica area.
“The import of cocoa beans from the Ivory Coast, thanks to the logistics of the Port of Pozzallo – explained Cappello – could fuel the on-site transformation activity to produce the bitter cocoa paste, the basis for the production of chocolate Modify respecting the rigorous provisions of the specification. The creation of an industrial plant for the production of bitter paste in the Iblean territory would be at the service not only of the producers of Modica’s PGI chocolate but also with an opening to national and international markets”.
A project also shared by Diakitè Siaka, president of the Association of cocoa processors and president of the primary coffee and cocoa export and processing company UINTERCC-CI, who relaunched by proposing the establishment of a joint venture between the Iblean entrepreneurs who want to start the cocoa bean processing activity and Ivorian producers for the construction of a plant in the Ivory Coast by bringing together the know-how and the technological skills of the two parties.
The meeting, organized by the deputy vice-president of Sicindustria Ragusa Mario Molè, was attended by important entrepreneurs from the province of Ragusa such as Giuseppe Battaglia (CER), Giovanni Spadola (Caffè Moak) and Andrea Eterno (Simfed); the president of the Modica Chocolate Protection Consortium, Scivoletto; Ignazio Abbate, president of the “Institutional Affairs” Commission of the Ars, and Nitto Rosso, general director of the Ragusa municipal consortium, representing the commissioner, Patrizia Valenti.
