Photos: Cocoa demand and new rules push up prices

Europe's robust cocoa demand and uncertainty over new environmental rules have pushed London futures to a big premium over beans traded in New York. Global cocoa prices have rallied this year as crop setbacks in top growers Ivory Coast and Ghana tightened supplies.

European chocolate demand proved more resilient than other regions and stockpiles started to fall. There are also concerns that European deforestation rules may have a knock-on effect of raising costs for the chocolate industry.

Cocoa traded in London now costs about $300 a ton more than US futures, according to Bloomberg calculations based on most-active contracts. London prices added 0.3 per cent to 3,500 pounds a ton on Friday.

In Nigeria - among the top five global cocoa exporters - harvest is forecast to fall by 4.4 per cent to 296,000 metric tons this year as ageing trees and a lack of access to adequate pesticides lowers yields, said in a report on Thursday.

The industry also remains on edge about how the European Union's new sustainability rules will play out. Traders delivering beans to the exchange will have to prove that the cocoa wasn't grown on recently deforested land.

The price increase is evident in Europe particularly increasing the rates projected for European chocolate this year. - Inputs from Reuters and Bloomberg