Assortment of fine chocolate candies, white, dark, and milk chocolate
Valentine’s Day is synonymous with love, friendship, and chocolate. Each year, millions of people across the globe gift their loved ones everything from truffles to chocolate in heart-shaped boxes. In the United States alone, consumers spend more than $20 billion on Valentine’s Day annually, and chocolate tops the list of items most frequently gifted. Chocolate is sourced from cacao, a crop that also demonstrates the importance of sustainability innovation in the industries we hold dear.
Humans have consumed cocoa for more than 4,000 years. While more recent, the crucial addition of sugar and dairy is centuries old. And yet, today, the chocolate supply chain is in deep trouble. The global cocoa trade has always been riddled with perils not immediately visible to consumers. Currently, risks are increasing to the industry itself. For this reason, and the sake of chocolate lovers everywhere, many in the business are working to creatively re-examine chocolate, from seed to bar.
Cocoa is grown in the global “coca belt”, a relatively small band of Equatorial regions, with the Ivory Coast, Ghana, and Indonesia leading global production. In cocoa-growing communities across the world, concurrent environmental and social pressures have led to a dramatic reduction in supply and a steep increase in prices in recent years. Cocoa prices doubled in 2024 alone, and the year closed out with prices at a 50-year high.
What is driving this trend? The first answer is the weather. Rising temperatures and irregular rainfall patterns have led to a significant decrease in yields in key cocoa-producing regions. In more extreme cases, droughts and floods have devastated crops. Second, decreased biodiversity and soil health mean the crops that do develop are less viable. Biodiversity loss and soil degradation stem from mainstream farming practices in a vicious cycle that increases price volatility and threatens future supply. Third, global cocoa production is home to substantial human rights abuses. Forced labor is rife. According to the U.S. Department of Labor, more than two million children work in cocoa production in Ghana and the Ivory Coast alone. As conditions in cocoa-producing communities worsen, workers who can do so seek other livelihoods, often by moving to cities.
The result is a serious threat to cocoa production at a time when demand for chocolate is anticipated to grow at between three and five percent annually in the foreseeable future. The supply chain is ripe for innovation. Tony’s Chocolonely, a Dutch chocolate company, has pioneered just such an approach: Tony’s Open Chain.
As a company, Tony’s has a crystal-clear mission: to prove that delicious chocolate can be made, at scale, without human or environmental exploitation. The firm long worked to improve sourcing and farming practices but became convinced that to change the industry, they would need to collaborate, even with other chocolatiers.
In 2019, Tony’s launched their Open Chain, a growing partnership of retailers who co-invest in improved systems for data quality, traceability, and resilience in the cocoa supply chain. Through GPS mapping, for example, Tony’s Open Chain has verified 99.95% of its supply chain as deforestation-free for the 2023/24 season – no small feat when cocoa farming is responsible for between 60-75% of deforestation in Ghana alone. Improved data from long-term suppliers has also enabled 98% and counting of Tony’s Open Chain farmer households to be covered by their Child Labour Monitoring and Remediation System. To improve biodiversity and soil health, Tony’s Open Chain supports planting 15-30 shade trees per hectare of farmed land with a minimum of six tree species per hectare, 50% of which are native. A diverse range of plant and tree species on farms attracts birds, animals, and insects, helping to maintain the kind of ecosystem balance that prevents the spread of pests and diseases that can decimate harvests.
Most important is the message Tony’s Open Chain sends about the power of collaboration. More than 20 retailers have now joined the initiative, a compelling example of how quickly innovation can scale when businesses work together to tackle shared challenges. Is the world running out of chocolate? Times are indeed tough, but data-driven industry collaboration like Tony’s Open Chain is the kind of innovation necessary to protect the cocoa supply chain for years to come. On Valentine’s Day or any other day, this truly is something to love.
