The Arts sector in Côte d’Ivoire: SWOT in “Books and Snacks”

1. How is the situation about the Arts industry in Côte d’Ivoire related to its economic and cultural foundation?

As one of the core countries for cultural and creative industries in West Africa, Côte d’Ivoire has long given high attention to its cultural and creative industries, and has provided in-depth support and promoted its development. The country’s cultural and creative industries cover a wide range, including publishing, handicrafts, music, visual arts, food culture and others, which have greatly enhanced the economic development level of Côte d’Ivoire and the quality of life of its residents, further promoting its foreign cultural exchanges and cultural dissemination, cultivating people’s sentiments, and inspiring more people around the world to be interested in and study the cultural connotations of Côte d’Ivoire.

On April 29, 2025, the West African Economic Gateway website conducted a related report. According to the relevant data, the number of cultural enterprises in Côte d’Ivoire was 2,831 in 2012, but by 2024, the number of related enterprises in the local area had reached 6,070. The revenue of this industry reached 171 billion West African francs in 2024. This shows that the cultural and creative industry has received great attention and achieved good development in the local area, and also reflects the strong support and active promotion of the local government for this industry. In 2022, handicrafts (including cultural food) contributed approximately 19.5% of Côte d’Ivoire’s GDP to the domestic economy. From 2015 to 2022, the added value of this field increased from 386 trillion West African francs to 865 trillion West African francs, an increase of 124%.

Meanwhile, the government of Côte d’Ivoire has incorporated cultural creativity into its national development plan (from 2021 to 2025), strengthened the protection of product copyrights and the cultivation of local IP, and the copyright income of Burkina Faso-Ivorian Copyright Office (BURIDA) reached 5.5 billion CFA francs in 2024.

2. What are the cultural and linguistic foundations of Côte d’Ivoire?

As a country where French is the official language, Côte d’Ivoire has produced internationally renowned writers such as Amadou Kuruma. Meanwhile, the local oral literature, including legends and proverbs, are important sources for book creation and modern literature. Additionally, the country has diverse tribal cultures, which have ancient origins and a long history. These cultures are witnesses to the continuous changes and development of the civilization on this vast land and are one of the local sources of book content and snack flavors for the cultural, artistic and creative industries of Côte d’Ivoire. For example, local characteristics woodcarvings and masks can be transformed into cultural books and packaging elements. Therefore, with colonial heritage and local culture deeply integrated，a distinctive product style of “French refinement + African local” is formed，which is extremely suitable for the local and French-speaking markets.

3.The local agricultural resource endowment

As the world’s largest producer of cocoa and the largest producer of cashew nuts, Côte d’Ivoire accounts for over 40% of the global cocoa production and 40% of the global cashew nut production. Both cocoa and cashew nuts are the core ingredients of local snacks. At the same time, Côte d’Ivoire also produces other local specialty foods, including cassava, bananas, peanuts, palm oil, etc. These greatly support the industrialization of traditional snacks such as Atiéka, Alokò (fried bananas), and peanut butter. The local agricultural policies have effectively promoted on-site processing of cocoa and cashew nuts, significantly reducing the production costs of local snacks and effectively enhancing their added value.

4. Côte d’Ivoire: Strengths Analysis of Books / Snacks (Arts Industry)

During its long-term development, Côte d’Ivoire has developed and possesses a rich and diverse range of local cultural resources. The diverse and mutually integrated tribal cultural characteristics, the solid foundation of French literature, the unique traditional stories and folk arts have provided natural materials for the design and production of book content creation, theme snack packaging, and artistic IP cultural products. These are the sources of inspiration for them, and all of these highly align with the positioning of the Arts industry.

Côte d’Ivoire is indeed the world’s largest producer of cocoa and cashew nuts. The agricultural raw materials produced locally have already led the world globally. The snack raw materials from this region are characterized by low costs and high quality, highlighting their natural differentiation. They possess extremely stable supply competitiveness on the international stage, which forms the core advantage of the Snacks sector.

The local government has given great attention to the cultural and creative industry and has established relevant policies to vigorously support the development and innovation of related industries, local publishing, and the deep processing of cocoa and cashew nuts. These projects are highly consistent with the future development direction of Côte d’Ivoire and demonstrate policy friendliness.

However, the “Books + Snacks” creative model has a unique identity in the cultural industry and demonstrates just the right degree of integration. Essentially, this combination is based on the composition of “cultural stories + local cuisine”, presenting the rich and wonderful cultural connotations and civilized spirit of Côte d’Ivoire in a material form, allowing customers to experience such a cultural atmosphere and independent atmosphere during their experience. However, in reality, in the highly competitive Arts industry, by combining books and snacks to form a “cultural content + specialty food” combination product, this creative model boasts the advantages of high recognition and strong premium potential, reflecting extremely high scarcity and recognition.

Due to similar and shared languages, cultures, and consumption habits, in the market expansion and competition in the West African French-speaking countries, Côte d’Ivoire has extremely high regional market potential. Especially its cultural and creative industry centered around books and specialty snacks has excellent export potential and vast expansion space. Moreover, the cultural products of Côte d’Ivoire are very in line with the local culture, taste, and aesthetics, reflecting extremely high local emotions and brand recognition. These advantages make it easier for local consumers to develop a deep emotional identification, which is more appealing than purely imported products.

5. Côte d’Ivoire: Weaknesses Analysis of Books / Snacks (Arts Industry)

The cultural and creative industries in Côte d’Ivoire have indeed experienced rapid growth. However, there are some shortcomings in the current state of the book market. Mainly, the local publishing capacity is weak, and the number of printing factories is significantly insufficient. There are obvious deficiencies in the number of local writers and their ability to innovate original content. At the same time, book creation and publication channels are mainly concentrated in cities, while the coverage in rural areas is relatively limited. Nevertheless, the local publishing language is mainly French, and the publishing houses are mainly located in Abidjan. The content of books focuses on literature, children’s books, cultural studies, and local history. However, there is still a need for improvement in local copyright protection, and the proportion of imported books from France and Belgium is higher in Côte d’Ivoire.

The productivity of cocoa and cashew nuts in Côte d’Ivoire does indeed have a significant advantage. However, there is a notable gap in the depth processing of snacks. According to a report by the West African Economic Portal on August 19, 2025, the local processing of cocoa has dropped to 31%, and most of the cocoa raw materials are exported overseas and then re-enter the market as finished products; the processing of cashews is mainly at the initial stage, and the deep processing capacity is insufficient. Thus, the proportion of local fine processing is low, and the product grade and stability are average.

Last but not least, street vendors, local supermarkets, and cultural and creative markets are the main forms of the market. However, e-commerce platforms like Jumia and Konga and the growth rate of transactions have significantly increased. Nevertheless, their consumption share is still relatively low. At the same time, local brands and supply chains are in the development stage. The management of product logistics, packaging, and shelf life is relatively weak and not fully mature. There are obvious shortcomings in the number of nationally renowned brands. The digital publishing in this country is still in its infancy. E-books and audio books have grown relying on mobile internet. The 4G network coverage in the country has exceeded 70%, but there is a shortage of supply on local digital platforms and content.

6. Côte d’Ivoire: Opportunities Analysis of Books / Snacks (Arts Industry)

The cultural and creative industry in Côte d’Ivoire has great potential for development. The local area is rich in elements such as numerous legendary folk stories, distinctive traditional patterns, mysterious ancient tribal cultures, and simple and rustic cocoa culture, which possess untapped resources and await full utilization by creators to transform them into colorful children’s picture books, plain local culture books, eye-catching snack packaging, and exquisite and unique cultural gift boxes. At the same time, the rise of cultural consumption has greatly stimulated the purchasing intentions of urban middle-class people, tourists, and young people, who are willing to pay for products based on local raw materials, healthy and additive-free, with beautiful artistic packaging. And local cultural products that integrate cultural connotations, external appearance standards, and personal stories can well avoid the price war with cheap imported snacks. Currently, many traditional venues such as bookstores, cafes, cultural centers, and art centers can create services mainly focused on reading, tasting, and experiencing scenarios to enhance customer satisfaction, repeat purchase rate, and brand image.

Similarly, the development of the cultural tourism market has also driven the demand for related cultural and creative gifts. Cultural gift boxes, mainly consisting of books and snacks, exude a strong artistic atmosphere, presenting customers with distinctive story IPs and special foods. Such souvenirs are highly suitable for use in tourism memorabilia, business gifts, and festival gift boxes, and have opened up a unique new path in the cultural and creative industry and the cultural tourism industry. They have a high premium value and development potential. In reality, the combination of “books + snacks” in gift boxes gives a seamless feeling, and there is a great demand from foreign tourists, business gifts, and festival gift boxes for this. There is a strong demand for such practical products with an artistic atmosphere, which are both edible and suitable for reading, that are highly characteristic of Côte d’Ivoire.

In recent years, the rise and rapid growth of the local e-commerce industry and social media industry have provided new channels for the trade of cultural and creative products. Online sales have gradually transformed the traditional brick-and-mortar store trade into a comprehensive, low-cost, and convenient new form that can be accessed without leaving home. This new model has become very popular among young people. These local art and cultural creative products are characterized by their small size, exquisite design, and affordability. They are mainly promoted to consumers through online shopping, short-video promotion, and social media dissemination.

As time goes by, the market of the West African regional integration is gradually expanding, which makes cross-border trade more convenient and is beneficial for the expansion of local brands’ foreign trade and the extension of their popularity. The French-speaking countries including Burkina Faso, Mali, Togo, and Benin provide a regional market size much larger than that of the local area for the cultural and creative industry development and expansion of Côte d’Ivoire. At the same time, the Côte d’Ivoire government has issued relevant policies, and cultural industries, publishing, artistic creation, cultural products, Books/Snacks are all policy-friendly projects, receiving full support and encouragement. The local government also vigorously encourages and promotes local processing labor, and continuously enhances the added value of the industry and products, which provides excellent opportunities for the development of cultural and creative snacks, allowing them to enjoy advantages such as raw materials, taxes, and industrial support.

Finally, there are significant gaps in the fields of children’s education and the parent-child market in Côte d’Ivoire. Among them, children’s picture books and healthy snacks represent high demand deficiencies. The number of local children’s books is relatively scarce, and healthy cultural snacks are also in a huge supply shortage. Both of these areas are in the direction that government policies encourage and families are willing to pay for.

7. Côte d’Ivoire: Threats Analysis of Books / Snacks (Arts Industry)

The development of cultural and creative industries in Côte d’Ivoire also has certain potential risks that cannot be ignored. The current sales situation of local creative products has some impact on the introduction of imported products. Although the development and design of local products have made significant progress, imported books and snacks from countries such as France and Nigeria have advantages in terms of price and brand, as they have stronger competitiveness.

Next, one of the external factors is the fluctuation of inflation and economic development, which is one of the important factors affecting customer consumption. In real life, people usually make comprehensive considerations and they will choose to purchase daily necessities first. Therefore, the production and sales of cultural and creative products, which are not essential goods or substitutes, will be greatly affected.

The government of Côte d’Ivoire does indeed attach great importance to the development of the cultural and creative industry and has thus introduced relevant policies to protect the intellectual property achievements of the practitioners. However, there are still areas where the local supervision of product copyrights and food safety needs to be significantly improved. Similarly, factors such as pirated products, counterfeit products, and quality pose risks that need to be paid attention to.

Finally, inadequate infrastructure is also a factor contributing to the risks, as the local logistics processes, cold chain development, and warehouse management are relatively weak. This significantly limits the scope of the expansion of snacks. Moreover, the lack of unified industry standards also poses significant obstacles and losses. The local cultural creation, food, and publishing industries lack unified norms, which is not conducive to comprehensive scale expansion.

8. Conclusions and advice

In Côte d’Ivoire, the Books and Snacks sectors of the Arts industry are highly valued by the government and the public, and have great potential for development.

This industry requires a deeper level of localization. Creators can enhance the local oral literature and historical content by writing books. In the snack sector, the processing rate of cocoa and cashew nuts needs to be increased to build the brand of “Made in Côte d’Ivoire”.

The integration of culture and innovation also needs to be accelerated, that is, to make “Books + Snacks” become a new sector in the Arts industry, so as to enable cultural empowerment to enhance product value and market competitiveness.

The marketing channels for cultural and creative products need to be integrated with digitalization. By combining traditional stores with online sales, making e-commerce platforms, cultural and creative markets, and tourism and cultural scenarios the main core channels, and through digital books and live-streaming of snacks to achieve rapid growth of cultural and creative products.

Policy-driven measures are also one of the important forces promoting the development of the cultural and creative industries. Copyright protection, agricultural processing subsidies, and cultural funds should continue to be given due attention to continuously expand the industry and promote the gradual improvement of local supply and consumption capabilities.

All in all, this is a distinctive field where cultural resources and agricultural resources mutually empower each other. However, there are also short-term issues that need to be addressed, such as local production capacity, prices, and distribution channels. Nevertheless, this industry is long-term dependent on cultural creativity and regional markets, and has the potential to become a benchmark for cultural creativity in West Africa.