Click here to read the Spanish version.
If you have noticed that the price of your favourite chocolate has gone up, you are right; this is not an isolated case. The price of cocoa is now 25% more expensive than it was a year ago, according to the latest data from the INE, which shows that since April last year the price of chocolate has been rising steadily.
This increase was forecast at the end of the year by the International Cocoa Organisation, which published a report in December warning about the sharp rise in cocoa prices, the main reason being bad weather conditions in the main cocoa producing regions such as Ghana and Ivory Coast.
The prices of this raw material have thus multiplied due to climate change, causing sharp rises. Since the end of 2023, cocoa has gone from 2,581 dollars per tonne to 10,371 dollars per tonne. The price increase has, in turn, triggered the destruction of consumer demand for cocoa. When prices soar, both consumers and the industry look for alternatives with new recipes in which they have to use less cocoa to mitigate the economic damage.
This tendency to lag seems to be starting to diminish during the course of this year. Analysts predict a 20% drop in cocoa prices during 2025, from over $10,300 today to around $8,300 per tonne by the end of the period.
