This Year's Trick or Treating May Take a Beating...

 From CNN:

Everybody knows it’s not Halloween without candy, but trick-or-treaters might find less chocolate filling their buckets this year.

That’s because cocoa prices have more than doubled since the start of the year and have remained at record highs, according to Wells Fargo data shared with CNN.

The surging prices have caused grief for confectioners during prime chocolate sales seasons like Valentine’s Day and Easter. And with Halloween as the next major candy-centric holiday, companies are getting creative with their ways of coping with the lack of cocoa. This means consumers might see smaller chocolate bars in different flavors and more non-chocolate treats on grocery aisle shelves.

“Cocoa is not like a normal agriculture crop where you have it grown everywhere, like other commodities. It takes a very specific site and temperature range to grow,” said David Branch, sector manager at Wells Fargo’s Agri-Food Institute.

But for the past three years, a series of adverse weather events has slammed the cocoa-producing regions of West Africa responsible for over 70% of global cocoa supply. 

El Niño raised temperatures and led to drought stress on the cocoa trees; torrential rains spread black pod, a fungal disease that affects cocoa trees and reduces yields; dry and dusty trade winds shaded the crop from sunlight and impacted development.

As a result, the International Cocoa Organization projected in August that global cocoa production this season would fall by 14.2%.

Chocolate giant Hershey was among the companies forced to grapple with sky-high prices. In August, it reported an operating profit of $287.8 million, a decrease of 48.7% from the previous year.