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The Closing of the Cocoa Frontier

• tomohawk 4y ago
  > In Ghana the implicit taxation on cocoa farmers increased from 20 per cent in 1960 to more than 80 per cent around 1980. Even more ruinous was the absurdly overvalued exchange rate which robbed Ghana’s farmers of any incentive to export their cocoa beans. The cocoa harvest collapsed by two thirds. Ghana was overwhelmed by foreign debts and reduced to trading cocoa beans for East German chemicals and Cuban sugar. In 1983 GDP per capita was 25 percent below its level at independence. Again and again - you're much more likely to be abused by your own government than someone else's.