The Cocoa Tree

Growing Cocoa

All chocolate products start with the cocoa tree, which originated in the upper Amazon basin. In the wild, it grows to 50 feet tall as an "understory" tree in the shade of towering 200-foot-tall hardwoods and other trees.

Cocoa Trees Aren't Easy To Grow

They're very picky about where they live. Cocoa trees require constant warmth and rainfall to thrive. They need to be shaded from the strong tropical sun and sheltered from the wind. Cocoa trees grow only in tropical regions of Africa, Asia, South America and Central America, within about 15 degrees of the equator.

Fruit of the Cocoa Tree

Cocoa Pods

Cocoa trees begin to produce their first fruit at three to five years of age. Cocoa trees produce football-shaped pods that contain the seeds that will become cocoa beans. A shade-grown cocoa tree can produce fruit for 75 to 100 years or more.

Cocoa Flowers

Tiny, intricate pink or whitish flowers grow along the trunk and main branches of the cocoa tree. These flowers must be pollinated before the tree can produce the pods that contain the seeds, or cocoa beans. Tiny flies are the main natural pollinators, but less than five percent of the flowers get pollinated. The cocoa farmer can also pollinate the flowers by hand.

Varieties Of Cocoa Trees

There are two main types of cocoa, with thousands of variations within these basic varieties, including some that have grown wild for thousands of years.

Criollo - Sometimes called the prince of cocoas because it is a very high quality grade of cocoa with exceptional flavor and aroma. Less than 15 percent of the world's cocoa is Criollo, grown mainly in Central America and the Caribbean.

Forastero - A much more plentiful variety of high quality cocoa, representing most of the cocoa grown in the world. Grown mainly in Brazil and Africa, it is hardier, more productive (higher yielding) and easier to cultivate than Criollo and is used in just about every blend of chocolate that is made.

A third type of cocoa, Trinitario, originated in Trinidad. It is a cross between strains of the other two types.

An Important Cash Crop

Small Family Farms

Most of the world's cocoa is grown on small farms, not large plantations. According to the International Cocoa Organization, 2.5 million farmers produce almost 90 percent of the world's cocoa on 5-10 acre holdings. Typically, cocoa is the family's main source of cash. Cocoa provides important income for small farmers in developing economies all over the world.

Price Cycles

Cycles of high and low cocoa prices impact the quality and quantity of cocoa production. Like most other agricultural crops, cocoa is subject to weather patterns and other influences which affect supply and demand, which in turn affect price. For example, in the late 1970s and early 1980s, high prices stimulated expansion in plantings. An abundance of cocoa beans on the world market resulted in subsequent price declines and a drop in farm income. Farmers could no longer spend the money necessary to care for their cocoa trees and still make a living, which in turn encouraged widespread losses from pests and disease.

The Problem With Plantations

The growing commercial demand for cocoa over the past century resulted in large cocoa plantations, where trees are grown in full sun and require extensive and costly fertilization and pest management. When cocoa trees are planted row upon row in the direct sun like apple orchards or orange groves, the trees become stressed and are more susceptible to pests and disease. Soil is more easily depleted. In addition, pests and disease can be passed more readily from tree to tree under these conditions.

Disease

In the 1980s, Costa Rica's cocoa plantations were wiped out by Monilia Pod Rot, a fungal disease that attacks the cocoa pods. Witches Broom, a virulent disease, has devastated cocoa plantations in parts of Brazil.