News

Chocolate companies warn of an impending shortage

November 18, 2014

Mars Inc. and Barry Callebaut, two chocolate giants, have warned of an impending chocolate shortage. The Washington Post reported their warnings, stemming from basic supply and demand issues – cocoa farmers are producing less cocoa than the world's population eats. The chocolate industry expects these deficits to continue and even grow; the story said 70,000 metric tons more cocoa were consumed than produced last year. That discrepancy could reach 1 million metric tons by 2020 and 2 million by 2030.

The short supply comes from dry weather in West Africa, where more than 70 percent of the world's cocoa is grown. These issues have forced many farmers to shift their focus to other crops.

Also affecting the supply:

• The Chinese are buying more chocolate every year;
• A fungal disease is killing the crop in some regions;
• Dark chocolate's popularity is rising (dark chocolate requires more cocoa to produce).

Prices of cocoa are up more than 60 percent since 2012, the story said.