ABSTRACT
‘Monseigneur was about to take his chocolate. Monseigneur could swallow a great many things with ease, and was by some few sullen minds supposed to be rather rapidly swallowing France; but his morning’s chocolate could not so much as get into the throat of Monseigneur, without the aid of four strong men besides the cook’. Cocoa is a middle-ranking commodity in world trade and, like the other beverages which are considered in this study, it is produced predominantly by developing countries. A core commodity under UNCTAD’s Integrated Programme, cocoa is a renewable resource produced only in tropical and sub-tropical climates with adequate rainfall; like coffee and tea, its essential characteristic is its distinctive flavour. For the first four decades of the twentieth century cocoa production rose steadily.
