U

S-based commodity company Cargill Cocoa and Chocolate Business plans to begin trial operations at the company'€™s cocoa processing plant in Gresik, East Java, by early June, while final preparations are under way for commercial operations, which are due to begin in August.

The plant '€” Cargill'€™s first in Asia '€” will have the capacity to process 70,000 tons of cocoa beans per year into various products, including cocoa powder, cocoa butter and chocolate liquor for customers in Indonesia and across Asia.

Cargill president Jos de Loor said Thursday that the investment made by the company demonstrated its commitment to developing and growing Indonesia'€™s cocoa industry, as well as meeting the demand from Cargill'€™s customers in the region, which was a very large and fast-growing market.

'€œWe are really looking forward to having this plant operational and supplying Indonesia as well as the rest of the region with our high quality products,'€ he told reporters on the sidelines of the Indonesian International Cocoa Conference and Dinner 2014 in Nusa Dua, Bali, on Thursday.

'€œThe commissioning [of the plant] will take us one step closer to realizing our plans to go live,'€ he said.

Cargill invested US$100 million on the plant'€™s construction and to train farmers in Sulawesi '€” where it has been sourcing cocoa beans since 1995 '€” in sustainability, to strengthen the company'€™s cocoa-sourcing network.

The new plant was expected to create more than 200 new jobs in Indonesia, de Loor said.

Cargill'€™s facility is the latest cocoa processing plant to be established in the country since the government imposed an export tax on cocoa beans in 2010, which triggered several foreign companies to invest in the industry due to declining supplies from Indonesia. These companies include Swiss-based cocoa manufacturer Barry Callebaut and Malaysia'€™s JB Cocoa and Asia Cocoa.

The local cocoa processing plants still rely on imports, however, to meet their supply demand. Indonesia produced 833,310 tons of cocoa in 2012, up by 17 percent compared to 712,231 tons the previous year, according to data from the Agriculture Ministry. This figure is expected to rise further to 1.1 million tons by the end of 2014, making Indonesia the world'€™s third-largest cocoa producer. The government is also debating whether to lower its cocoa-bean import duty to ease imports.

To maintain the firm'€™s supply, Cargill'€™s development director, Job Leuning, said the company had been conducting a Farmers'€™ Field School. The program trains local farmers to improve bean quality, implement best agricultural practices and increase yields.

Cargill launched the program in 2012 in Bone, South Sulawesi, training more than 13,000 local farmers in sustainability. This month, it added the province'€™s Soppeng regency, and plans to train another 3,000 farmers.