Chocolate’s Bitter Truth
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The Latin name for the fruit from which chocolate comes is Theobroma Cacao which translates as Bitter fruit of God.Bitter because Cacao (pronounced ca-cow) is more bitter than lemons. But the bitterness of chocolate is far deeper than its taste and is a shocking story.
When Columbus ‘discovered’ South America in 1509 the welcoming natives brought him Cacao beans. To them the beans were a highly prized supper fruit – full of fat, containing more4000 antioxidants that blue berries, and when turned into a sugared chocolate drink, gave those drinking it a choccy high. It was highly addictive and had a mysterious ritualistic role within Mayan and Aztec cultures.
There is a famous story of a Spanish bishop who, when visiting his new colonial diocese in South America, discovered the women so addicted to chocolate that they drank it during church services. He banned it during Mass so the women stopped going to church. Eventually, the women sent the bishop a gift of poisoned chocolate and that was the end of him!
As demand for the South American drink grew across the chocolate houses of 17th century Europe the Church helped the Cacao growers organise their farms into plantations. These quickly became forced labour slave plantations. The Cacao tree was exported to Africa and plantations developed on the Ivory Coast.
The most bitter truth about chocolate is that it provided the economic template for what was to become the Transatlantic Slave Trade and played a role in developing the unjust economic structures operating in the world today. It is a sad fact that by the time the Transatlantic Slave Trade was abolished it was no longer needed as these unfair economic structures were in place. Freed slaves had few rights, did not own their own farms and, if they did, growers were given very little for their Cacao and other goods such as cotton, tea, sugar and coffee.
The Fairtrade system works by cutting through the legacy of unfair economic structures. It guarantees growers a minimum price for their goods, regardless of market trends and growers receive a cash premium to invest in their community.
Adapted from an article in February Manchester Cathedral News by David Marshall
Note recent additions to Fairtrade goods –
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