It’s Easter this weekend, so for the season of chocolate we thought we’d take Shortcuts off the beaten track and look at the world of chocolate production.

How good is chocolate?
So good that Aussies eat around 5 kilograms per year… which is not even close to the Swiss, who are the biggest chocolate fans, eating around 11 kilos each per year. Those Easter eggs really add up…

They sure do… but where does all that chocolate come from?
The real question is: where does the main ingredient, cocoa beans, come from… and the answer is that cocoa trees are native to the Amazon rainforest, but have since spread around the world. They can only grow close to the equator, so that’s where all of the cocoa beans are grown.

Which countries specifically?
Most of the cocoa bean farms are in the west of Africa, in the Ivory Coast, Ghana, Nigeria, and Cameroon. Those 4 countries account for 70% of the world’s cocoa bean production, with the Ivory Coast and Ghana being the 2 major producers.

So cocoa bean production is quite concentrated…
It sure is, and that’s where we get into a bit of trouble. Climate change has been blamed for disrupting normal weather patterns in West Africa, and last year saw higher-than-average rainfall in the area… which has caused problems for cocoa trees. Farms in the area have been more susceptible to fungal black pod disease, as well as other crop-destroying diseases.

That sounds bad…
Farmers in Ghana and the Ivory Coast lost significant portions of their crops, and conditions aren’t set to improve. The El Niño weather pattern is predicted to bring dry weather to that part of the world, which also causes cocoa bean crop yields to fall.

These are fussy plants…
It seems like it, and the upshot is more expensive cocoa… Prices on the world market recently hit an all-time high – compared to this time last year, a ton of cocoa costs 150% more. We’ve also started to see some reports in the last month of cocoa processing plants in Africa running well below normal levels…

Sounds like chocolate is about to get more expensive…
Don’t be surprised if it does… But there’s another part of cocoa farming we should know about. We’d be missing a big part of the story if we didn’t talk about the people farming cocoa…

Who are these people, then?
For the most part, cocoa farms are relatively small, sometimes family-run enterprises. And there’s a dark side: since 1998, there have been allegations and documentation of child labour being used in cocoa farming.

Uh oh…
Child labour in cocoa become a big issue at the time, and in 2001, 2 US politicians worked with the major chocolate companies to set a target to end the “worst forms of child labor” by 2005. This work became known as the Harkin-Engel Protocol, named after Senator Tom Harkin and Congressman Eliot Engel. But 2005 came and went, and that goal was not reached…

When was the goal reached?
This is awkward, but it still hasn’t been. The deadline kept being pushed back, first to 2008, then 2010, then 2015, then to 2020… And at the same time, the target was changed to reduce child labour in Ghana and the Ivory Coast by 70%. Even that target has not been met though, and child labour in cocoa production is an ongoing issue today.

Cocoa production really has some problems, doesn’t it?
It sure does, so let’s look at some proposals to fix those problems. When it comes to the effects of a changing climate on cocoa trees, one suggestion is that the farms move away from “monocropping” and towards “agroforestry”.

We’re going to need to explain that…
Currently, a lot of farms are cleared out to only grow cocoa trees – that’s known as monocropping. A shift towards agroforestry would see cocoa trees planted alongside other trees or crops, which would help to improve soil fertility and reduce disease.

What about cocoa’s child labour problem?
Well, one suggestion from the anti-child labour advocates is that the big handful of global chocolate companies – Mars, Hershey, Nestlé, Ferrero, and Mondelez – should just pay more for their cocoa beans, so that farmers have less of a reason to use cheap child labour. There are also certification schemes, like Fair Trade, that aim to ensure farmers are paid a living wage for their work.

What can we chocolate-eaters do?
If you want, you can try to find chocolate that is covered by a reputable certification scheme which means it’s less likely to have child labour in its supply chain. You can also take the chance this Easter to share this Shortcut and make your friends and family aware of the real cost of cheap chocolate.

Happy Easter, then…
Hey, don’t shoot the messenger.

Squiz recommends:
Watching: The wonderful John Oliver of Last Week Tonight has his own segment on chocolate, which covers a lot of the same ground but with better jokes…

Eating: Tony’s Chocolonely is a Dutch brand that was started by a journalist called Teun van de Keuken. He was looking into child labour in the chocolate industry, and wanted to prove that he could make delicious, profitable chocolate without child labour… so we reckon it’s worth giving it a go, even if it’s a bit more exxy.