Chocolate-coated cashews are particularly popular with the French military base nearby. The local market is quite small, and rich markets like Europe are pretty distant for a product that melts. That's really a problem for those who want a big, avorean chocolate industry. In other countries, over time people move out of agriculture into jobs in the cities. And for Ivory Coast, that is probably still the only way to sort of really transform the economy.
A pair of crises will bedevil Europe, starting with crippling energy prices in the short term. And American protectionism threatens a longer-term dent in the continent’s green-industry ambitions. A visit to Ivory Coast’s cocoa operations reveals why balancing farmers’ welfare and market forces is so tricky. And what Britain’s street names reveal about its history and its ideals.
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