FLAVOR PROFILE: light white fruits & Milk Chocolate undertones, + emerging pockets in some parts of the country with brown fruit & spice
CHARACTERISTICS: under review
Surmised to be a transship point for cacáos voyaging across the Pacific from its American homelands. If so, Solomon Islands may have received pedigreed breeds originating in, given current understanding, Venezuela.
Today, it ranks as the largest South Pacific island producer at ~7,000MT, cultivated by some 20,000 stakeholder families. The main local processor & exporter — C-Corp Ltd. – handles most of it from there.
Thru their combined efforts, cacáo represents the 3rd most important export earner for the country, right behind logging & palm oil.
Much of the commercial crop now stems from material planted in the 1980s with newer, more recent types entering from PNG. This follows a similar pattern to Australia. And for good reason: Australia is both a major export market for Solomon Islands cocoa (as is Singapore) & underwriter of the sector’s developments thru AusAID.
