The Hershey Company (NYSE: HSY) announced today that its innovative mobile phone program, CocoaLink, is expanding to Cote d’Ivoire (Ivory Coast), which is the world’s largest producer of cocoa. CocoaLink helps farmers grow greater quantities and higher quality of cocoa through farm training provided by low-cost SMS messages and expert exchanges via mobile phones. Hershey joined with the Conseil Café-Cacao (CCC) of Ivory Coast and nine other companies in creating CocoaLink Cote d’Ivoire, which is expected to enroll 100,000 cocoa farmers by 2016...Hershey first launched CocoaLink in Ghana in 2011 with the Ghana Cocoa Board and the World Cocoa Foundation (WCF). Through CocoaLink, more than 350,000 SMS messages have been provided at no cost to 18,000 cocoa farmers in more than 500 communities. More than 35 percent of CocoaLink users are women. "Modernizing cocoa farms means creating better lives for growers, their families and communities...We are delighted to be working together with so many other companies and leading development agencies to expand CocoaLink into Cote d’Ivoire. Mobile phones are a proven tool in reducing rural poverty and isolation while increasing community education...", said Terry O’Day, Hershey’s Senior Vice President, Chief Supply Chain Officer.