Cocoa's surge to a record-high price after bad weather and crop disease ravaged harvests in West Africa has raised costs for chocolate makers around the world as demand exceeds production by 374,000 tons.

Cocoa has reached a record-high price following adverse weather conditions and crop diseases that severely affected harvests in West Africa. This surge in cocoa prices has led to increased costs for chocolate makers globally. The demand for cocoa now exceeds production by 374,000 tons, putting significant pressure on chocolate prices worldwide.



Chocolate prices to surge as cocoa hits record high

you admitted that you are stockpiling chocolate. Why are you stockpiling chocolate. Do you really think that it's going to get that much worse out there. I stockpile of olive oil last year. I was very happy when the price went through the roof. I'm a stockpiling some chocolate because we eat quite a lot at home. Must confess that. And the price of cocoa is up 150 percent. You make chocolate out of cocoa a bit of sugar a bit of milk. Prices of chocolate on the on the supermarket. It's going to go up and go up quite significantly over the next six months. The market for cocoa is facing a structural deficit. Supply is well behind the demand. Probably the gap between demand and production is going to be in 2024. The largest it has been at least in 65 years. So we have a problem. And the only cure for the market right now is higher prices. So we are going to see a bit of higher prices in the supermarket. So I'm I'm just anticipating from that higher prices less chocolate. That's already what these chocolate companies are telling us Javier. But when you look at the market in terms of cocoa is it what's going on in West Africa in terms of bad weather and drought and disease on some of these crops or is it tariffs that are coming into play from Europe. There is a mix of factors. I mean certainly the weather has been very unfavorable. It has been dry recently. It was too wet a few months ago. We have new regulation from the European Union on deforestation which means that beans that have been producing new planted area can go into the European Union. That's not going to help. But I think that the biggest problem is that the world is relying on a group of West African countries for 60 percent of the cocoa. That's a Ghana Ivory Coast and Nigeria and Cameroon. There has been very little planting in those countries for the last few years. The trees are all they're producing less and less. And those trees are also more sensitive to bad weather and to disease. And we have had a lot of that in recent months. Diseases are really quite widespread both in Ghana and Cote d'Ivoire and Ghana and Ivory Coast. And that is the big problem at the moment. But it's a combination of all of the above which is really restraining supply this year and perhaps also into next year.

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