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ABIDJAN, May 30 (Reuters) — Above-average rain in most of Ivory Coast´s cocoa regions last week will strengthen the April-to-September mid-crop, although more sunshine is needed to prevent mouldy bean deliveries, farmers said on Monday.
The world’s top cocoa producer is in its rainy season, which runs from April to mid-November, when downpours are abundant and often heavy.
Many farmers said they were expecting more beans to leave the bush next month as plenty of big pods were ripe.
August to September harvests would be larger than last season if favourable weather continued, they added, noting that more sunshine was required to properly dry beans.
«The mid-crop will be more abundant this year because at the moment trees have more small pods than last year,» said Alfred Semian, who farms near the centre-western region of Daloa.
That region saw 32.5 millimetres (mm) of rain last week, 5.4 mm above the five-year average.
Similar observations were made in the central regions of Bongouanou and Yamoussoukro and in the eastern region of Abengourou, where rains were also above average.
In the western region of Soubre, at the heart of the cocoa belt, farmers said lack of sunshine was causing more beans to go mouldy, although high soil moisture indicated good growing conditions.
«On trees everything is going well. But we need a lot of sun to dry and stock properly,» said Louis Dopo, who farms near Soubre, where 32.6 mm fell last week, 14.1 mm below the average.
Rains were also below the average in the southern region of Divo but above average in the southern region of Agboville, where farmers said the cocoa outlook was promising.
Average temperatures ranged from 25.2 to 27.2 degrees Celsius last week.(Reporting by Loucoumane Coulibaly; Editing by Sofia Christensen and Bernadette Baum)