Poorly Paid Cocoa Farmers Aren't Keeping Up with Growing Demand

Posted byVirtual FarmgirlPosted inUncategorized

A coworker sent this Gizmodo story to me today as a sign of the coming apocalypse: “We’re Running Out of Chocolate.”

According to the story, consumers are eating more chocolate than ever and production isn’t increasing with demand.

At the heart of the problem is paying a fair wage to the farmer. To make matters worse (for chocolate lovers), there’s less and less incentive for cocoa growers to stay in the business. Eighty cents a day just isn’t cutting it. So many West African cocoa farmers are turning to more lucrative crops, farming for rubber or abandoning farming outright and taking opportunities in cities.

Does that mean we’re all going to have to develop a taste for carob (ugh)? Or will we see $11 Snickers bars?

Gizmodo reports that the big chocolate companies – Hershey and Mars – are on it. They’ve sequenced the cacao genome and are working to develop more resilient trees.


Photo from Artshooter’s Flickr photostream.

Published by Virtual Farmgirl

Virtual Farmgirl is a communications professional with a dream of one day becoming a real farmgirl.

4 thoughts on “Poorly Paid Cocoa Farmers Aren't Keeping Up with Growing Demand”

  2. That's the trouble with farming. Sometimes you don't even make 80cents a day. Other than that it is a lot of fun.Methinks there is more to this story as demand, if there truly is one and I do my bit, generally drives prices.

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  4. That's the trouble with farming. Sometimes you don't even make 80cents a day. Other than that it is a lot of fun.Methinks there is more to this story as demand, if there truly is one and I do my bit, generally drives prices.

    Like

    Reply

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