Visit Indian Travel Sites
Goa,
Kerala,
Tamil Nadu,
Andhra Pradesh,
Delhi,
Rajasthan,
Uttar Pradesh,
Himachal Pradesh,
Assam,
Sikkim,
Madhya Pradesh,
Jammu & Kashmir
Karnataka
|
20 years later, chocolate 'might be as expensive as gold' | Chocoholics might want to stock up on chocolate after they read this - experts have claimed that in the next few decades, an average man will simply not be able
to afford chocolate. "In 20 years chocolate will be like caviar. It will become
so rare and so expensive that the average Joe just won't be able to afford it,"
The New Zealand Herald quoted John Mason, executive director and founder of the
Ghana-based Nature Conservation Research Council, as saying. Farmers in the countries
that produce the bulk of cocoa do not get incentives for the time-consuming work
of replanting as their trees die off - a task that usually means moving to a new
area of canopied forest and waiting three to five years for a new crop to mature.
The children of these African cocoa farmers, whose life expectancy is only 56,
therefore prefer working in cities than undertaking backbreaking work for such
a small reward. "The other challenge is that cocoa is competing for agricultural
space with other commodities like palm oil - which is increasingly in demand for
biofuels," explained Thomas Dietsch, research director of ecosystem services at
the Earthwatch Organisation. "Chocolate consumption is increasing faster than
cocoa production - and it's not sustainable," Tony Lass, chairman of the Cocoa
Research Association, told the annual conference of Britain's Academy of Chocolate
last month. To make matters worse, the soil in Africa's traditional cocoa fields
is rapidly becoming depleted. "Production will have decreased within 20 years
to the point where we won't see any more cheap bars in vending machines - unless
they are made with carob instead of chocolate," said London chocolatier Marc Demarquette.
But some believe that chocolate lovers will save the chocolate industry from extinction
by paying whatever it takes for the good stuff. A spokesman from Cadburys suggested
that scarcity might be averted through Fair Trade initiatives. "It's hard to imagine
a world without a demand for chocolate, but whether it remains the low-cost snack
food it is now may well change in time," said Earthwatch's Dietsch.
|
|
|
|
|
|