05/28/2026
Did you know that social and environmental justice issues are at the heart of the craft chocolate industry? There's a few different ways we work on this in the industry.
The craft chocolate industry is heavily involved in reforestations efforts. There is a large biodiverstiy project in South America called The Jaguar Corridor, which connects patches of forest around the continent together to provide safe travelling for the keystone species the jaguar, as well as many other animals. Cacao, the plant we get chocolate from, is being used as a shade tree to occupy the middle layer of canopy where they thrice in the shade. Different varities of cacao are being planted, as well as similar species such as jaguar cacao and cupuassu. Some of this wild cacao us foraged to make chocolate, and these wild beans tend to give more complex notes and are usually very fruity. We carry a bar made by in partnership with that is an excellent example of this.
Growing a vareity of plants is more disease and pest resistant naturally, which then reduces the amount of pesticides and other chemicals. Plants grown like this also require much less fertilizer, often no fertilizer is needed. Jaguar cacao and cupuassu fruit are both being used to make chocolate to make the chocolate itself and as flavours added to the bar. You will see the rare Jaguar cacao single origin darks, and cupuassu seeds contain much more fat than cacao seeds. This means it can be used in replace of cocoa bars in making chocolate and other uses such as skin care products. We don't see it being used much yet but it is slowly getting more popular! You can tree the Jaguar tree cacao as a whole seed woth smoked paprika from
The last bar shown here comes from Virunga National Park. These beans are grown by the first ever women's cacao cooperative, founded in 2008 in partnership with . These beans tend to be more deeply fudgey with brown spice notes to it. Right now Virunga needs our help! Virunga National Park has had 8 million people displaced in the area due to the Ebola outbreak! If you are able to help, the link to donate is in the link in our bio.
