The Ghana cocoa industry contributes substantially to the total world cocoa production and provides livelihoods to more than a quarter of the population. Although cocoa holds a leading position in the Ghanaian economy, no explicit effort has been made in modelling and documenting the business processes of the cocoa supply chain and the role that IT plays in supporting those processes. Hence, it is difficult to identify the current obstacles in adopting IT in the Ghana cocoa sector, and likewise, enhance the alignment of the business processes along the supply chain and the underlying IT systems. To address this issue, this article presents the results of a survey study to the current business processes of the cocoa supply chain and the underlying IT systems in Ghana. The survey study has been conducted with 56 individuals from the three key sets of actors from the sector, which are cocoa farmers, cocoa traders and the Ghana cocoa board. Based on the results of the survey study, we provide formal business process models of these actors and describe the role IT currently plays in supporting the business processes. We report on the lessons learned together with the obstacles and thus aim to pave the way for further development and enhancement of the business processes as well as the adopted IT.

加纳可可产业为世界可可总产量做出了巨大贡献，并为四分之一以上的人口提供了生计。尽管可可在加纳经济中处于领先地位，但并未在建模和文档化可可供应链的业务流程以及IT在支持这些流程中所扮演的角色方面做出明确的努力。因此，很难确定加纳可可部门在采用IT方面当前遇到的障碍，并且同样难以提高供应链上的业务流程与基础IT系统之间的一致性。为了解决此问题，本文介绍了对加纳可可供应链和基础IT系统当前业务流程的调查研究结果。这项调查研究是与来自该行业三个主要参与者的56名个人进行的，他们分别是可可豆种植者，可可商人和加纳可可委员会。根据调查研究的结果，我们提供了这些参与者的正式业务流程模型，并描述了IT当前在支持业务流程中所扮演的角色。我们报告所汲取的经验教训以及障碍，从而为进一步发展和增强业务流程以及采用的IT铺平道路。