The Economics of Chocolate

by Mara P. Squicciarini (Editor), Johan Swinnen (Editor)

Overview

This book, written by global experts, provides a comprehensive and topical analysis on the economics of chocolate. While the main approach is economic analysis, there are important contributions from other disciplines, including psychology, history, government, nutrition, and geography. The chapters are organized around several themes, including the history of cocoa and chocolate — from cocoa drinks in the Maya empire to the growing sales of Belgian chocolates in China; how governments have used cocoa and chocolate as a source of tax revenue and have regulated chocolate (and defined it by law) to protect consumers' health from fraud and industries from competition; how the poor cocoa producers in developing countries are linked through trade and multinational companies with rich consumers in industrialized countries; and how the rise of consumption in emerging markets (China, India, and Africa) is causing a major boom in global demand and prices, and a potential shortage of the world's chocolate.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780198833406
Publisher:	Oxford University Press
Publication date:	05/20/2019
Pages:	506
Product dimensions:	9.10(w) x 6.10(h) x 1.20(d)

About the Author

Mara P. Squicciarini, Post-Doctoral researcher, LICOS-Centre for Institutions and Economic Performance, KU Leuven; Research Fellow, Research Foundation Flanders (FWO),Johan Swinnen, Professor of Economics and Director, LICOS-Centre for Institutions and Economic Performance, KU Leuven

Mara P. Squicciarini is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Economics at Bocconi University and a research affiliate at the CEPR, the Dondena Research Center, IGIER, and LICOS. She received a BSc in Economics from Bocconi University, a joint MSc in Economics from Bocconi University and Université catholique de Louvain, and a Ph.D. in Economics from the University of Leuven. She has also been a Postdoctoral Researcher at Northwestern University and Visiting Researcher at Stanford University and at UCLA. Her research has appeared in journals such as Science, Nature, and The Quarterly Journal of Economics and has been profiled in media outlets such as The Economist, The Financial Times, Harvard Business Review, Freakonomics.

Johan Swinnen is Professor of Economics and Director of the LICOS-Centre for Institutions and Economic Performance at the University of Leuven; a Visiting Scholar at the Centre for Food Security and the Environment at Stanford University; and President of the International Association of Agricultural Economists and of The Beeronomics Society. He has published widely on global food security, political economy, institutional reform, trade, global value chains, and product standards. His books include Quality Standards, Value Chains and International Development (CUP, 2015), Political Power and Economic Policy (CUP, 2011), The Economics of Beer (OUP, 2011), and From Marx and Mao to the Market (OUP, 2006).

Table of Contents

1. The Economics of Chocolate: Introduction and Overview, Mara P. Squicciarini and Johan SwinnenPart I. History2. A Brief Economic History of Chocolate, Eline Poelmans and Johan Swinnen3. Chocolate Consumption from the Sixteenth Century to the Great Chocolate Boom, William G. Clarence-Smith4. From Small Chocolatiers to Multinationals to Sustainable Sourcing: A Historical Review of the Swiss Chocolate Industry, Ingrid Fromm5. From Pralines to Multinationals: The Economic History of Belgian Chocolates, Maria Garrone, Hannah Pieters, and Johan SwinnenPart II. Consumption6. Chocolate Consumption, Manufacturing, and Quality in Europe and North America, Heike C. Alberts and Julie Cidell7. Nutritional and Health Effects of Chocolate, Stefania Moramarco and Loreto Nemi8. Health Nudges: How Behavioral Engineering Can Reduce Chocolate Consumption, Sabrina Bruyneel and Siegfried Dewitte9. Chocolate Brands and Preferences of Chinese Consumers, Di Mo, Scott Rozelle, and Linxiu Zhang10. Consumers' Willingness to Pay for Fair Trade Chocolate, Pieter Vlaeminck, Jana Vandoren, and Liesbet VrankenPart III. Governance and Industrial Organization11. Sustaining Supplies in Smallholder-Dominated Value Chains: Corporate Governance of the Global Cocoa Sector, Niels Fold and Jeff Neilson12. Beyond Fair Trade: Why are Mainstream Chocolate Companies Pursuing Social and Economic Sustainability in Cocoa Sourcing?, Stephanie Barrientos13. Policy Reform and Supply Chain Governance: Insights from Ghana, Cote d'Ivoire, and Ecuador, Sietze Vellema, Anna Laven, Giel Ton, and Sander Muilerman14. Chocolate Brands' Communication of CSR in Germany, Nina Langen and Monika Hartmann15. Chocolate Regulations, Giulia Meloni and Johan SwinnenPart IV. Markets and Prices16. The Dynamics of the World Cocoa Price, Christopher L. Gilbert17. Concentration and Price Transmission in the Cocoa-Chocolate Chain, Catherine Araujo Bonjean and Jean-Francois Brun18. Belgian Chocolate Exports: Quality and Reputation versus Increased Competition, Filip Abraham, Zuzanna Studnicka, and Jan Van HovePart V. New Chocolate Markets19. The Burgeoning Chocolate Market in China, Fan Li and Di Mo20. Hot Chocolate in the Cold: The Economics and Politics of Chocolate in the Former Soviet Union, Saule Burkitbayeva and Koen Deconinck21. Too Hot to Handle: The Explosive Growth of Chocolate in India, Emma Janssen and Olivia Riera22. Back to the Roots: Growth in Cocoa and Chocolate Consumption in Africa, Seneshaw Tamru and Johan SwinnenIndex

Editorial Reviews

"A well-written collection of research reflecting various perspectives on the cocoa-chocolate value chain, history, consumption, sustainability, social responsibility, governance, market prices, and expected growth in demand especially in China, Russia, India, and Africa. The authors successfully convey a complex history of governments' interventions as well as recent public, private, and nongovernmental organizations' attempts to encourage sustainable, ethically produced chocolate."

—E. J. Peterson, California State University Stanislaus

From the Publisher