The streets smell of chocolate. In Treichville, an industrial district of Abidjan, the long rows of warehouses give off a sweet smell half the year. That of beans sweating in the ambient heat. It is in this strategic environment for Côte d’Ivoire, the world’s leading exporter of cocoa, that Sifca’s headquarters are still located. As if to remind us that this West African behemoth, which today lives off palm oil and rubber, has built its fortune thanks to the precious beans.
The country’s leading private employer, which today has 30,000 employees, including 18,000 permanent employees and generated a turnover of 689 billion CFA (1 billion euros) in 2021, occupies a slightly outdated building of several floors. There are lots of offices there, of course, but also souvenirs. Upon entering, the visitor is greeted by an enigmatic smile surmounted by thick black glasses with orange lenses: “Pierre Billon, founder of the Sifca group”, announces the caption. Through the services, other shots, framed in dark wood adorned with gilding, present the historical leaders, shaking hands with officials or fraternally kicking the ball. A family box side in its own juice. Blended family version.
On one side, the Billons. In the early 1960s, in a newly independent Ivory Coast, the man in dark glasses was one of the few Ivorians to own a business. Métis, Pierre Billon was born to a French father and an Ivorian mother from Dabakala, an administrative center then lost in the northeast. He inherited the essential oil factory founded by his father, which exports its bergamot and lemongrass fragrances for renowned perfumers such as Dior and Guerlain.
Flamboyant years
For Côte d’Ivoire, these were the first years of flamboyant independence. The country remains to be built, cocoa money is flowing and President Félix Houphouët-Boigny is thinking big. The Hotel Ivoire is inaugurated, whose huge swimming pool seems to reproduce the meanders of the Ebrié lagoon, which stretches out at its feet. It’s Dubai before its time: the establishment boasts an ice rink, the only one in Africa. The Head of State also dreams of Ivorian champions to build his country: Pierre Billon will be one of this handful of elites supported by the power that we still call today the “big families”.
In 1964, the patriarch launched into the export of cocoa and coffee by joining forces with a Frenchman. Business is going well and, from the 1970s, the trader becomes industrial by venturing into the grinding of cocoa. In the family tradition, Billon is an engineer, trained at the Ponts et chaussées, in Paris. Technical challenges do not put him off. ” A great gentleman our dad “says his eldest son Jean-Louis. Those who knew him evoke a loyal man, but quick to divide in order to better reign. “ Very elegant », « spirit », « very excessive too, recalls a partner. ” But beware ! Excessive as a quality, and in everything: in his recognition as in his anger.he says.
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