Chocolatier Barry Callebaut Sees Cocoa Shortages Persisting
- Market faces 500,000 shortfall this season, 150,000 next year
- Swiss company is world’s largest maker of bulk chocolate
Cacao beans from Boyaca.
Photographer: Mariana Greif Etchebehere/Bloomberg
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A Swiss company that’s the world’s largest maker of bulk chocolate expects acute cocoa shortages to persist into next season as farmers in West Africa lack the incentive to expand output.
Barry Callebaut AG, which supplies some of the biggest consumer chocolate brands, expects cocoa production to fall short of consumption by 500,000 metric tons in the season that started in October, according to Hugo van der Goes, the company’s vice president for cocoa in North America. Another deficit of 150,000 tons is expected the following season.