Agriculture and Environment: Commodities

Overview: Cocoa (Theobroma cacao)

Chocolatl - the Aztec word for the drink and the source of our word chocolate - originated along with chocolate itself in the western Amazon.

By 1500 cocoa was the most valuable cash crop in Mesoamerica (Henderson 2001). Cocoa cultivation began in the Americas an estimated 3,000 years ago (Smith et al. 1992).

It had already been planted throughout the American tropics by Amerindians at the time of European conquest. The inhabitants, however, consumed the product as a bitter, spicy beverage prepared with hot peppers. Sweetened, solid chocolate was not invented until after cocoa was taken to Europe.

Cocoa was so valuable in ancient Mesoamerica that the beans served as a form of currency, one that literally grew on trees, throughout the markets of the region. The coastal lands, where cocoa grew best, were highly valued by Indians and Spaniards alike. Along the Mosquito Coast of Honduras, cocoa seeds were used as money to buy things in village markets as late as the 1980s. In the state of Bahia and other cocoa producing areas of Brazil, cacao, the Portuguese term for cocoa, is still slang for money.

From the beginning of its trade, cocoa was very popular in Europe. Initially, however, it was because of its purported medicinal qualities, for which Amerindian peoples had also used it. It was said to make women conceive, help with childbirth, facilitate digestion, and cure consumption.

It was supposed to cure the plague, cough, fluxes, jaundice, inflammation, and kidney stones; it was also supposed to clean the teeth, sweeten breath, provoke urine, expel poison, preserve from all infectious disease, and help emaciated patients gain weight (Henderson 2001). (At least one of those medicinal properties proved to be correct!)

Two varieties of the species, Theobroma cacao, are commonly cultivated: criollo and forastero. Cocoa liquor, butter, powder, and cake - the primary ingredients of chocolate - are all derived from the plant's bitter purple seed. Up to a few dozen seeds (about two centimetres long and half that in diameter) are found within each cocoa fruit pod. The leathery pods contain white fleshy pulp in which the seeds are embedded.

In some areas, fresh juice from the pulp is consumed locally, but some pulp must be left on each seed in order for it to ferment properly and maintain the value of the seed for making chocolate.

Cocoa was introduced into European markets after the conquest of Mexico and Central America. Almost immediately, it was prepared with sugar and, by 1800, with milk.

Due to increased demand, small-scale production spread in the Americas and to the Philippines by 1600. The crop was introduced into present-day Indonesia and India before 1800 (Wood 1991). By 1800 global production was 13,500 metric tons, and Ecuador was the largest producer, followed by Central America and several Caribbean Islands (Hardner et al. 1999).