A European Union (EU) decision made in 2014 hurt cocoa growers 5,000 miles away. It’s a story that reveals why exporters must monitor changing contaminant standards if they want to keep their export markets.
Seven years ago, the EU ignored its own assessment concluding there was no significant risk from dietary exposure to cadmium and in turn adopted highly restrictive limits of cadmium in cocoa and chocolate products. Some Latin American cocoa has relatively high levels of cadmium because it is grown in volcanic soil, meaning the EU’s new standard jeopardized the export of these products.