West African plantations will churn out huge amounts of cocoa during the early months of this season thanks to near-ideal growing weather, and the full harvest is likely to rival last year's record volumes.

The region produced a record of nearly 3.2 million tonnes of cocoa during the 2011-12 season that just ended, raising its share of the global market to about 75 percent from two-thirds.

The banner crop came despite a war in top grower Ivory Coast and was attributed mainly to ideal weather from the La Nina phenomenon -- a pocket of cooler-than-normal water in the Pacific -- which is expected to return this season.

The outlook could further dampen global cocoa futures prices and reinforce emerging expectations for a supply surplus during the 2011-12 season, which are slowly replacing earlier predictions of a small deficit.

The International Cocoa Organisation (ICCO) said last month it saw a possible balanced or surplus market in 2011-12, defying the market's consensus for a small deficit.

"Good rainfall in West Africa in August and reports of good pod counts suggest the 2011-12 crop could be better than initially anticipated by the market," Rabobank said in a research note.

Officials in West Africa's four main growers -- Ivory Coast, Ghana, Nigeria and Cameroon -- have put out initial forecasts for the crop that add up to nearly 2.9 million tonnes, but they appear to be weighed down by a conservative outlook from Ghana. - Reuters