Difficult weather conditions and disease have affected production in West Africa, which produces about 70% of the world’s cocoa. The two largest producers, Ivory Coast and Ghana, have been hit by a combination of heavy rain, dry heat and disease recently.
Late last year, heavy rain and the spread of black pod disease in the two countries affected farming, according to a November report from the International Cocoa Organization. Poor road conditions also made it difficult to bring the available beans to port, according to the report.
There’s even some speculation that chocolate will go extinct because it is unable to continue under future conditions, that the only chocolate available will be grown within sterilised growing areas and cost a lot.
Same thing will happen to bananas within the next ten years by the way. So in about 30 years “banana for scale” won’t mean anything to young people.
It’s already happened before. They will just replace the banana again like they did back then. The last banana is all but extinct now. I bet the new banana is already in development and is being made to stave off disease. E: This is also why banana candies you get from the vending machines taste nothing like bananas. They taste like the old bananas.