Why is chocolate getting so expensive?

Why is chocolate getting so expensive? A lot of ingredients go into a chocolate bar, including sugar and milk, but the one which gives chocolate its namesake—cocoa—is in particularly short supply at the moment.

Thanks to a combination of bad workplace conditions, climate change and insatiable global demand, cheap chocolate will be in very short supply, and experts aren’t sure when it’ll improve. Here’s how we got here, and how you might be able to get the most bang for your buck the next time you’re shopping for chocolate.

What makes cocoa so expensive?

Basically, there isn’t enough of it on the market. Over half of the world’s cocoa, the key ingredient in chocolate, is grown in just two West African countries—Côte d’Ivoire and Ghana. If you count all countries in the West African “cocoa belt,” it comes out to around 80% of the world’s supply.

Most of the farmers growing this cocoa are very poorly paid, which has some seeking alternative sources of income for their land. According to a 2023 report from Corporate Accountability Lab on West Africa’s cocoa industry, hired workers in Côte d’Ivoire earn about USD$0.89 to USD$1.34 per day. Farmers sometimes cannot afford to hire paid help, and rely on family members to harvest their crops. To make extra money, farmers sometimes give their fields to illegal gold miners for cash, which degrades production.

To make matters worse, Côte d’Ivoire and Ghana are facing disastrous growing conditions for cocoa. Last year’s El Niño weather event left the West African region hotter than normal. Unpredictable rainfall mixed with dry spells is also wreaking havoc on cocoa tree growth. And swollen shoot disease, which destroys cocoa trees and is spread by insects, is getting worse in Côte d’Ivoire.

With the global market so dependent on this region, any disruptions mean rising cocoa prices. This week, the going rate for cocoa beans nearly hit USD$10,000 a ton on the New York Futures Exchange. (Futures are derivatives. They’re contracts to buy or sell an asset for a set price at a later date.) Just last summer, it was around USD$2,500 a tonne. And demand isn’t letting up. The global chocolate market is expected to grow by about 4% annually between 2024 and 2030, according to Grandview Research.

Canadian shoppers also have to deal with the various reasons why groceries are expensive—not just chocolate. Not only is Canada’s grocery market very concentrated, and therefore more vulnerable to price-fixing, but the sheer size of our country means it isn’t cheap for food suppliers to send their products to market.

Add all of these problems together, and Canadian chocolate shoppers will be hard-pressed to find any deals this year.