In 1997, IPS(WA) expanded its activities into agribusiness, a logical move given its strong impact on the development of rural areas.

The Institution joined with the Paul Reinhart Trading Company to form a consortium, which created Ivoire Coton, a company specialising in:

• The supervision of over 40,900 farmers, cottonseed collection,
• Transportation and ginning, and 
• The sale of seed and fibre, both locally and for export.

Ivoire Coton’s annual ginning capacity is 170,000 tons and it processes the output from some 150,000 hectares of cotton in North-Western Côte d’Ivoire.

Continuing its expansion into agribusiness and leveraging the expertise developed in Côte d’Ivoire, the Institution created Faso Coton in 2004 in Burkina Faso. Faso Coton oversees more than 30,000 cotton growers and processes approximately 35 to 45,000 tons of cotton per year.

IPS(WA) and partners from Burkina Faso acquired SN SOSUCO (Nouvelle Société Sucrière de la Comoé), which is Burkina Faso’s largest private employer. It operates its own sugarcane plantations on 4,000 hectares and produces 35,000 tons of sugar per year. Its core businesses are:

• Sugarcane cultivation,
• The manufacture of light brown or white sugar (granulated and cubed),
• The packaging and sale of sugar to the local market and for export,
• The recovery of by-products and new crop testing.

In 2014, IPS(WA) commissioned the project CAJOU DES SAVANES (CASA), consisting in the creation of a semi-automatic cashew kernel processing plant, located in Bouaké with an ultimate annual capacity of 10,000 tons. In 2022, CASA has merged with Ivoire Coton.