Cocoa Association of Asia confirms revised date for 2022 conference
The Cocoa Association of Asia (CAA) has confirmed its revised dates for its international conference for next autumn, which was postponed last year amid the ongoing pandemic, reports Neill Barston.
As the organisation revealed, the two-day event will now take place between 1-2 September, 2022 in Singapore, with the biennial event attracting more than 400 global participants together from across the industry.
The conference has acted as a key forum for the region’s cocoa and chocolate sector, involving key stakeholders and decision makers, including influential businesses across supply chains in offering a platform to discuss strategic topics of common interests.
Earlier this year, Confectionery Production caught up with the organisation’s chair, Alvin Lee, in an exclusive video interview, in which he underlined some of the major tests facing the region’s cocoa sector, including tackling the coronavirus pandemic and wider market uncertainties.
There will be ample network opportunities as we recognise this is especially important after more than 2 years of travel restrictions, the conference will end with a spectacular dinner event.
Among the core topic areas are the macroeconomic outlook for Asia, latest supply and demand outlooks, Marketing, and innovation Trends, as well as sustainability.
Since the 2017, the conference theme “Making Asian Cocoa Great Again,” has seen economic growth within Asia, resulting in changing lifestyles, and boosted consumption of cocoa products, raising demand year on year. Consequently, the region’s cocoa processors are now reportedly heading for their busiest year on record.
However, as the CAA noted, in contrast to the reported boom in demand, there has been concern surrounding dwindling production of Asian cocoa – giving the outlook for the fundamental supply a particularly high importance.
In terms of grind performance, the organisation noted that despite challenges within production volumes, grind results set anew record for Q2 in Asia Pacific and is the 3rd highest number in CAA history.
In its view, this reflected a positive recovery from a Covid-pressured 2020 and puts the cocoa & chocolate industry back on an encouraging growth path. Registrations for the conference are set to open shortly.
