Originally published on cgiar.org by:Bioversity International on May 4, 2007
Rome, Italy

A new project from Bioversity International will use high-quality chocolate to link poor farmers in Nicaragua to gourmets in Europe and North America. The farmers will gain income, independence and improved lives. The gourmets will enjoy new and unimagined delights of complex-flavoured chocolates based on single varieties of cacao. And the environment will benefit from organic and sustainable farming, at the same time as the diversity of cacao is preserved for future generations. The €500,000 project is funded by the Austrian Development Agency, with additional contributions from local and international partners.

About 1200 farm families make a poor living in the community of Waslala, in the buffer zone of the Bosawas Biosphere Reserve in Nicaragua. The reserve has put an end to their shifting agriculture, which involved clearing a patch of forest, growing crops for a few years, and then moving on. But it offered no alternative. Many farmers have a few cacao trees, from which they harvest the beans that go into cocoa and chocolate. Most of these are modern disease-resistant hybrids, but of low quality and low earning potential. There are also a few of the older trees, called criollo, that produce much better cocoa, but these are vanishing rapidly as a result of neglect.

It is these older and diverse trees that the new project will focus on. Working with local partners and foreign chocolate companies and scientists, Bioversity will improve the yields and processing to increase the quality of the cocoa beans. Trade links will be strengthened, with organic standards and farmers getting a fair price for their produce. Women, especially, will be trained and empowered, because they are vital in the processing of cocoa beans.

"With our partners we will work at all steps in the chain from cacao farmer to chocolate eater to give everyone a taste of the riches of cacao diversity," said Bioversity International scientist Dr Michael Hermann, who will manage the project. "I don't know which I am looking forward to more, better lives for the farmers or better chocolate."

For further information, contact Cassandra Moore