The Ghana Cocoa Board (Cocobod) on Wednesday announced that purchases of the 2003 light crop season would commence on Friday, June 13.

A statement signed by Mr Kwame Sarpong, Chief Executive, said the producer price to be paid at all buying centres is 255,000 cedis per load of 30 kilograms for grade one and two cocoa beans naked ex-scale or 531,259 cedis per bag of 64 kilograms gross.

It said a tonne of 16 bags is 8.5 million cedis about 990 dollars according to the exchange rate of the cedi released by the Ghana Association of Bankers on Wednesday.