I read their reasoning why they’re stopping, but my gut tells me China is behind this. They’re actively tapping Africa for natural resources and I wouldn’t be surprised if there’s some dealings behind closed doors to hand over cacao to China.
Ghana will no longer sell cocoa to Switzerland
231–240 of 437 posts
Re: Ghana will no longer sell cocoa to Switzerland
#232Earlier quoted context omitted.
Same. I am concerned they are overlooking how much marketing mind-share Switzerland has globally for chocolate. Ghana could get there but it will not happen overnight, more like a generation. Distribution will also take time. Give that cocoa is their number 3 export - and I suspect most of that is in raw form - I really hope this doesn’t backfire. They need foreign currency. A wiser path might be to build up global c…
They can process the beans and no one will notice. There are a lot of cocoa processors who produce bulk chocolate for other brands who melt that down to form their own products. Companies like Barry Callebaut or Valrhona primarily supply other companies with chocolate.
I will notice - it's not easy obtaining Kosher certification in Ghana.
Re: Ghana will no longer sell cocoa to Switzerland
#233Earlier quoted context omitted.
> So the book argues that when developing countries are pressured into free trade agreements This should have been obvious since the Opium Wars and the Opening of Japan (see Commodore Matthew Perry). All developed countries are pro free trade for markets where they are strong and fiercely protectionist where they are not (or they consider those markets strategic priorities). I'm from Romania. Romania joined the EU in…
That's where China was smart I guess. They didn't sign any treaty which forced them into free trade or IP protection, but instead slowly allowed their industries to build up via IP theft and strong protectionism. Now they have giant companies on par with the West's. Whereas everyone who joined the EU in the decade of 2000 (and the Washington Consensus before that in the nineties) is now a pawn of the Western capital…
Funny you say that because exactly the opposite thing happened to China. They were completely taken advantage of in the 19th century and didn't fully recover from that until a 100 years later when Nixon and Kissinger in one of their "4D chess" moves restarted diplomatic relations as a way to limit the Soviets.
From that point on they had a pretty clever long view policy but it would have been surprising if they hadn't. They spent the previous century getting fucked by foreign invaders, if they hadn't learned how to resist it by the 1970's then Chinese culture as we know it would have been doomed to collapse by the 90's.
And truth be told they almost did in 1989. If the CCP was a little less organized, if the military was a little less loyal and if the protesters had their shit together a bit more it could have turned into a full popular revolution.
Re: Ghana will no longer sell cocoa to Switzerland
#234Earlier quoted context omitted.
I really think China is making a huge mistake actually. See how TSMC (Taiwan) and Samsung are free to buy ASMLs EUV machines, while China is blocked. Part of that is due to their rampant IP theft. Why sell machines to China if they're just going to copy them? China also messed up big time by enforcing their 1 child policy, and taking so long to open up and industrialize. They're far behind economically compared to wh…
Uuh have you not heard of xiaomi or oneplus? They're already creating high value goods.
DJI drones is another example
Re: Ghana will no longer sell cocoa to Switzerland
#235Earlier quoted context omitted.
How i fairtrade a scam? Please be aware that the market of cocoa is not an easy one and not very transparent. The Dutch TV maker Teun van der Keuken was devastated by what he saw in Ivory Coast with a lot of child slavery going on. He started his own slavefree brand Tony Chocolonely, but even they have to admit they can not guarantee it is slavefree made, they can only strive for that. By the way, the people from Nes…
I didn't realize Tony Chocolonely was intended to be a slave free brand, I had bought it in Europe thinking it had a hilarious name and large size - the background of traditional brands sold in the US sounds horrific if he decided to make his own company based on what he saw, which haven't even penetrated our domestic market.
You can purchase Chocolonely at Natural Grocers and Sprouts in the US, if they're in your area. It's the best quality chocolate I've ever purchased that didn't come from a chocolate shop, highly recommend it.
Coco is sold on world markets as a commodity good. Suppliers can't know what country the beans originated. To get guaranteed slave-free chocolate you effectively have to create your own logistics for that specific purpose. Any chocolate producers that haven't done that will have some amount of slave-produced coco mixed into their supply chain.
Re: Ghana will no longer sell cocoa to Switzerland
#236Earlier quoted context omitted.
> So the book argues that when developing countries are pressured into free trade agreements This should have been obvious since the Opium Wars and the Opening of Japan (see Commodore Matthew Perry). All developed countries are pro free trade for markets where they are strong and fiercely protectionist where they are not (or they consider those markets strategic priorities). I'm from Romania. Romania joined the EU in…
In 2002-2005 I worked with all the supermarket and hypermarket chains in Romania, I still have a couple of friends in CxO positions in the top 5 companies; you are missing the full picture on what happened there, but the story is too long for a comment here; the 2007 change had zero impact of what already happened in the early 2000s.
I wanted to keep it simple for non-Romanians. The process started as Romania was implementing the EU acquis, after 1999.
I'd be interested in the story, if you have time, but my only comment for everyone else reading this, these are technicalities, regarding the gist of my comment. They only change the timeline, but the main idea is the same.
Re: Ghana will no longer sell cocoa to Switzerland
#237"With Ghana’s move towards processing its own cocoa, the world, and not just Switzerland, will experience a massive shortage since Ghana is responsible for about 45% of the world’s cocoa." That seems like bigger news than the headline.
That 45% figure in the article is wrong; Ghana produces about 18% of the world's production.
They hold a lot of the world market because they have low prices. If they raise their price, their market share will drop, and other countries could move in and take their position. There's simple market economics at play.
Re: Ghana will no longer sell cocoa to Switzerland
#238Earlier quoted context omitted.
That's where China was smart I guess. They didn't sign any treaty which forced them into free trade or IP protection, but instead slowly allowed their industries to build up via IP theft and strong protectionism. Now they have giant companies on par with the West's. Whereas everyone who joined the EU in the decade of 2000 (and the Washington Consensus before that in the nineties) is now a pawn of the Western capital…
I really think China is making a huge mistake actually. See how TSMC (Taiwan) and Samsung are free to buy ASMLs EUV machines, while China is blocked. Part of that is due to their rampant IP theft. Why sell machines to China if they're just going to copy them? China also messed up big time by enforcing their 1 child policy, and taking so long to open up and industrialize. They're far behind economically compared to wh…
The 1 child policy is probably a big issue but IP theft is partly how the US industrialized. The textile mills of the North that kicked off industrialization in the US was based off of IP stolen from Britain. In fact, many of the practices that the Chinese are using were also used by the Americans: smuggling plans, hiring key employees, tariffs, etc.
https://www.realclearmarkets.com/articles/2018/07/30/ip_thef...!
Re: Ghana will no longer sell cocoa to Switzerland
#239The nerve of that website to beg for donations while being plastered with advertisements
I know HN prefers not to discuss site misbehavior, but since there is already is a thread...
This site had it all. I think I had something like 4 or 5 overlaying popups/infocards, plus ads. When I tried to scroll it redirected me to the next page, and then it hijacked the back button on top of that.
Revisited to count the garbage: Donation beg, cookies, sticky ad on the bottom, "Add to home screen", "install our app", notification bell button. White space in the content area, with an ad underneath. No content visible at all.
Re: Ghana will no longer sell cocoa to Switzerland
#240Earlier quoted context omitted.
> So the book argues that when developing countries are pressured into free trade agreements This should have been obvious since the Opium Wars and the Opening of Japan (see Commodore Matthew Perry). All developed countries are pro free trade for markets where they are strong and fiercely protectionist where they are not (or they consider those markets strategic priorities). I'm from Romania. Romania joined the EU in…
Are those supermarkets really all that French or Belgian anymore? In practice, many large companies are owned by investors from all over the world looking for diversification.
Aldi the 3rd (or 4th) biggest supermarket chain is still owned essentially by the Aldi families (there are in fact 2 Aldi chains, because the brothers could stand each other.