For generations, the family cocoa farms of Ghana have produced beans of wondrous quality. Ghanaian farmers harvest the ripe cocoa pods by hand, ferment the beans between banana leaves right on the forest floor and then dry the beans in the warm African sun. To this day, European and American chocolatiers buy cocoa beans from Ghana and export them to their chocolate factories throughout the world where the famed Ghanaian beans are transformed into some of the world's most delicious and expensive chocolate. Ghana, AfricaNow, for the first time, The Omanhene Cocoa Bean Company is producing world class chocolate entirely in Ghana using beans The Financial Times calls "the finest cocoa in the world." Steven C. Wallace founded the company in February, 1991, at the age of 29 convinced that if Ghana could grow the "world's finest cocoa", it ought to be able to produce some of the world's finest chocolate. Wallace's interest in Ghana began in 1978 when, as a sixteen year-old, AFS high school foreign exchange student, he lived in the town of Sunyani located in the fertile Brong-Ahafo region of the country. His host family was a traditional Ghanaian family consisting of his host father, his three wives and twenty-one children. Omanhene Chocolate Bean CompanyOmanhene has proven itself one of the most successful and creative joint ventures between the U.S. and Ghana. We have won accolades from United Nations Secretary General Kofi Annan, Shirley Temple (former ambassador to Ghana) and President Jimmy Carter. We produce value-added gourmet chocolate tailored specifically to export markets resulting in enhanced foreign exchange revenues for Ghana. The sale of Omanhene chocolate results in higher revenues and consequently higher wages for both workers at the chocolate factory and for local cocoa farmers. Since cocoa is a commodity crop, farm incomes in Ghana are subject to world cocoa price fluctuations. Ghanaian cocoa farmers have previously been forced to abandon their farms when world cocoa prices stagnate.