Starter culture fermentation of cocoa may become a novel approach to the effective utilization of some waste by‐products in the cocoa industry. Cocoa sweatings could be rapidly collected for use in food product development when some strains of yeasts are used as starter cultures for the fermentation. The action of the yeasts in degrading cocoa pulp which is 76–80% esterified to cocoa sweatings is most likely due to presence of polymethyl galacturonase, since pectin esterase activity was completely absent in all the yeast strains tested. The pectin content of the resulting cocoa sweatings could be used to regulate the period of sweating collection depending on its intended use in food product development.