Cocoa's Struggles: From Farm to Fortune

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This chapter explores the challenges faced by cocoa farmers in West Africa, focusing on their struggles with climate change, low profitability, and the inequities of the cocoa supply chain. It highlights personal stories of families caught in poverty amid the multi-billion dollar cocoa industry, while critiquing the decision-makers who inadequately address their needs. The narrative underscores the stark contrast between the wealth of chocolate corporations and the dire circumstances of cocoa producers, as well as local initiatives striving for change.

A visit to West Africa and Western Europe to look at the cocoa trade. Did the colonial side of early capitalism – Western countries getting rich at the expense of poorer nations – ever change, or does it continue today?

Reported by Ugochi Anyaka-Oluigbo and written by Ugochi and Loretta Williams, with co-hosts John Biewen and Ellen McGirt. Story editor: Loretta Williams. Mixed by John Biewen. Interviews with Achike Chude, Chernoh Bah, Bart Van Besien, and others. Music by Michelle Osis, Lilli Haydn, Chris Westlake, Alex Symcox, and Goodnight, Lucas. Music consulting by Joe Augustine of Narrative Music. "Capitalism” is a production of the Kenan Institute for Ethics at Duke University, in partnership with Imperative 21.