The cost of chocolate is soaring, but blaming cocoa prices doesn’t give the whole picture

By Peter Alexander, Professor of Global Food Systems, University of Edinburgh

Familiar bars of chocolate have been getting more expensive, and often smaller. Is this really just because cocoa has become more expensive, as is often claimed in the media?

In the UK, a Cadbury Dairy Milk “family” bar has shrunk from 200g to 180g since 2021. In the same period, the price has risen from £1.86 to about £2.75, a price increase of around 65% once you account for the smaller size. Over the same period, overall consumer…

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