The price of a ton of cocoa briefly exceeded the symbolic $10,000 mark on Tuesday March 26 in New York. The most traded contract, for delivery in May, was trading in the middle of the afternoon, at 9,931 dollars (9,167 euros). In London, cocoa also broke records, exceeding 8,682 pounds sterling (10,120 euros) per tonne.
The surge in prices began in earnest in 2023, driven by fears of supply shortages, moving to an even higher speed in 2024. Over the past year, they have tripled in New York, increasing by 135% in 2024 alone In London, it is 144% over the same period. Before the recent series of records, the previous all-time high of $5,379 per ton dated back to 1977.
Towards an increase in the price of chocolate
Prices reflect the pessimism of the sector. Ivory Coast and Ghana, which produced nearly 60% of the world’s cocoa beans for the 2022-2023 harvest, according to estimates from the International Cocoa Organization (ICCO), have suffered a succession of climatic events and their consequences: heavy rains, fungal diseases then droughts. The harvest, which runs from October to the end of March, looks very bad. François Griffon, market analyst at Nitidæ, explained to Worldat the beginning of February: “According to estimates, Ivorian cocoa production for the 2023-2024 campaign could amount to 1.8 million tonnes, compared to 2.3 million tonnes the previous year. »
The next step on the supply chain is the chocolatiers. The rise in prices should, in the near future, still have an impact on consumer prices. “We expect prices of sweet treats to increase in response to this massive price hike”summarized Kathleen Brooks, an analyst.
The Swiss chocolatier Lindt & Sprüngli had warned, even before the symbolic exceeding of 10,000 dollars, that its prices would increase again in 2024 and 2025 after having already been raised by 10.1% on average in 2023. In Switzerland, the leading country chocolate eater in the world, consumption per capita had already decreased by 1%, to 10.9 kilos, in 2023, recalled Chocosuisse, the employers’ federation of the sector.