Why we don't take any detours when it comes to cocoa
It’s no secret that we at KoRo like to take the direct route. In fact, it’s at the heart of our business: shortening supply chains wherever possible. We’ve already shown how it’s done with our mangoes from West Africa, for example – now it’s cocoa’s turn.
Why do we skip middlemen? Simple:
To be closer to the origin: We want to understand how our products are grown and under what conditions they are harvested.
To have influnence on our products: Only by knowing our local partners can we truly influence quality and social standards.
Transparency: We want to know exactly where every bag of cocoa beans for our cocoa nibs comes from.
Why Peru specifically?
When we launched the project, we set our sights straight on South America. Peru is, after all, a true pioneer in organic and Fairtrade cocoa! Over 150,000 tonnes of cocoa are exported from here every year. But Peru impresses not just with quantity, but above all with quality, which for us means exceptionally high-quality cocoa and a high level of transparency.
The bigger picture: Fairtrade cocoa
We love chocolate. But we also know that cocoa is one of those raw materials where you should look not just twice, but three times. Widespread poverty, deforestation, gender inequality and bitter realities such as child labour or forced labour are, unfortunately, not uncommon in the industry. Cocoa is also mostly traded on the world market as anonymous bulk goods. You buy in bulk, but in doing so completely lose track of who grew the beans and under what conditions.
That is precisely why we have set ourselves the goal of switching our cocoa products to Fairtrade. This is a complex process that we are driving forward product by product. Because Fairtrade offers the crucial levers: Through minimum prices, premiums for community projects and the promotion of decent working conditions, the bean’s journey becomes fairer. Want to know what this looks like in detail? In our blog post about Fairtrade, we explain exactly how the label works.
KoRo and the chocolate factory: Visiting the “Willy Wonkas” of Pichanaki
“Bienvenidos a la fabrica de Willy Jesica y Willy Nelson” – that’s what it says in capital letters on the sign that greets us at Choco Peru. And even though there isn’t, unfortunately, a river of liquid chocolate there (which is probably just as well for hygiene reasons), the team definitely has the trained taste buds and passion of a Willy Wonka.
The team behind the cocoa
“Willy Number One”: That’s Jesica. A Peruvian activist and tireless advocate for social inclusion. Together with her husband Marvin, a Canadian who has lived in South America for decades, she founded Choco Peru. Their goal is to maintain a platform for ethical cocoa production that benefits the people and nature of the Amazon region. In the heart of Pichanaki, in the province of Chanchamayo, they have built a factory close to fields, farms and forests to guarantee full traceability and quality at every stage. Alongside Jesica, the whole operation is run by ‘Willy Number Two’ aka Nelson. He may still be young, but as a true cocoa professional, he has been given the opportunity to manage the factory.
Creating value where it belongs
What makes Choco Peru so special to us? Instead of simply loading the raw pods onto a container bound for Europe, the processing into cocoa nibs takes place right there on the ground. This has two major advantages:
Impact on site: Jobs and economic value remain in Peru.
Full transparency: Not only do we know the producer of our cocoa nibs, but we also know exactly in which region and under what conditions the beans were grown.
Incidentally, the factory is still relatively new and is constantly being expanded. So we’ve been there right from the start, so to speak, as something great takes shape here.
The cocoa bean's journey
The journey from tree to nibs is a true craft. We’ll take you along:
1. The harvest
The first surprise upon arrival: Instead of neat rows, the cocoa grows amidst a wild mixed crop of oranges, ginger and turmeric. Not only does this look beautiful, but it also promotes biodiversity and secures an income for the farmers beyond the cocoa bean.
Harvesting is done by hand with a machete. The local experts can tell straight away which pods are ripe. But anyone expecting to see brown beans when they’re split in half will be disappointed: the inside is bright white! That’s because the beans are still encased in a light-coloured pulp. Naturally, we couldn’t resist giving it a go! It tastes fantastically fruity and sweet, but has absolutely nothing to do with chocolate. By the way: ‘Sucking’ on the bean was, of course, just our tourist version – fortunately, in production, the process of exposing the beans works a little differently.
2. Fermentation
Time for a quick Spanish lesson: Do you know what cajones are? Translated, it means something like “drawers” or “wooden boxes”. And it is precisely into these boxes that the cocoa beans go for the next step – fermentation. The beans are covered and turned three times every two days. To allow the so-called “baba liquid” to drain away, the cajones have holes in the bottom. The heat generated during fermentation breaks down the fruity pulp, causing the bean to separate from it.
Incidentally, it’s very easy to check whether the fermentation level is right: you simply open the beans and look at the colour. Are seven out of ten beans brown instead of purple? Congratulations, we’ve reached a fermentation level of 70%!
3. Drying
Now it’s time for some fresh air! Huge quantities of cocoa beans are spread out on large boards outdoors. Solar dryers are used here, allowing the cocoa beans to bask in the Peruvian sun twice a day. The aim: the moisture content must drop below 8%. Once this level is reached, they are loaded into large sacks. A little fact from the field: as this step takes place outdoors, it can sometimes happen that a small stone or a twig finds its way into the sack. But that’s exactly why our partners at Choco Peru have their ‘magic tables’.
4. Sorting
Shake it off, shake it off… At Choco Peru, there’s no Taylor Swift song playing in the background, but there’s still dancing! As soon as the dried beans arrive, they go straight onto the shaking table. The vibration literally makes the cocoa beans dance. Not only does this look spectacular, but it also serves a crucial quality-control purpose: the shaking reliably removes foreign objects such as small stones.
What’s impressive is that, despite modern technology, nothing can replace the trained eye of the team on site. As the beans move across the table, they manually sort out anything that doesn’t belong – be it foreign objects or beans that don’t meet quality standards. Only once every cocoa bean has passed this ‘check’ is it ready for the roasting process.
5. Roasting
When you push the curtain aside to enter the next area, the intense silence of the sorting room gives way to a wall of heat, noise and a distinctive aroma. At last, it smells exactly as we had dreamed it would: of freshly roasted cocoa! The beans are tipped into huge drums by the sackful. At Choco Peru, we focus on gentle roasting at low temperatures. Why? Because the degree of roasting has a huge impact on the flavour. If the beans were roasted too intensely, they would become bitter. Through precise adjustment, the team brings out exactly the nuances that make the cocoa nibs so delicious later on.
6. Winnowing
Now everything is literally taking shape! After roasting comes the so-called winnowing, the process of shelling and breaking the beans. The machine uses a technology where the fine husk of the beans is cleanly removed using a vacuum, and the cocoa beans are then split into nibs. The cocoa nibs themselves end up in a special cylinder and are then sorted into nine (!) different sizes. Why go to all this trouble? Because every end product requires a different texture – whether as a crunchy topping for your morning muesli or as an ingredient in ready-to-eat snacks. Anything that doesn’t end up in the bag as pure nibs is processed straight away into cocoa paste, butter or liquor.
What we’re taking back from Peru (apart from cocoa)
Christina and Flo are now back in the Berlin office – the humid jungle and the noise of the machines in Pichanaki are thousands of kilometres away. What remains, however, is much more than just a few photos in our luggage. The best thing about this trip for us was the feeling of having cemented a genuine, trusting relationship with our local partners.
We now know not only where our cocoa nibs will come from in future, but above all, who is behind them. With Marvin, Jesica and Nelson, we can talk openly about challenges and work together on solutions. For us, that is the very essence of transparency. When we hold a packet of our cocoa nibs in our hands in future, we will no longer see just a product. We will see the handiwork of the smallholders, hear the rhythmic dancing at the shaking table and smell the aroma of the roasting drum.