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global market. For this reason, economists refer to the steps in a commodity’s supply chain as a value chain. At the bottom of the chocolate supply chain are the esti- mated 5 million small-scale farmers who produce the world’s cocoa supply. Cocoa farms are scattered across Africa, Asia, and Latin America, but the vast majority of the world’s cocoa beans come from just two countries in West Africa: the Ivory Coast and Ghana. At the top of the supply chain are a handful of large multinational companies that dominate the global cocoa market. Just three manufacturers—Mars, Hershey, and Nestlé—control about 75 percent of the world’s total choco- late sales. These corporate titans shape market prices and set the terms of trade. They also capture the lion’s share of the profits from the global cocoa industry. Out of the total price you pay for a candy bar, a tiny fraction—an average of just 4 percent—ends up in the pockets of the cocoa farmers who produce chocolate’s essential ingredient. This is a decrease from the 16 percent share that cocoa farmers earned in the 1980s. By contrast, as much as 70 percent of the final price tag goes

to the manufac- turing compa- nies who produce the name-brand prod- uct—up from 56 per- cent three decades ago.

Global Trade, Poverty, and Inequality 11