A story in the local paper sent a chill down my spine. It was more terrifying than Senator James Inhofe, Chairman of the Environment and Public Works Committee and a world class climate change denier, bringing a snowball into the Senate Chamber as a ‘real life example that the globe is not warming’.

As we digest that last bit of information, let’s take a moment and alleviate our fears from fabricators of fossil fuel foolery by partaking of a portion of our favorite treat; chocolate. Humans use it as a way to disconnect from the hectic world, if only for a moment, and descend into the sweet abyss of ‘chocolate love’.

But wait……

In 2012 a plateau was reached when the world started eating more chocolate than it could produce.

In fact, in 2014 the world ate roughly 70,000 metric tons more cocoa than it produced prompting the world’s largest chocolate makers predict a CHOCOLATE SHORTAGE!!!!!

The Washington Post reported that Mars, Inc. and Swiss-based chocolate giant Barry Callebaut say chocolate demand is likely to outstrip production by one million metric tons by 2020.

OK, calm down, we still have a very large supply. Sorry I agitated the chocolate lovers out there. There’s no need to run out and stock up on Hershey Bars; but if you do, that will leave the more expensive and exquisite chocolates for us connoisseurs.

Why, in the name of tasty snacking is a chocolate shortage slowly becoming reality?

This is because;

1, of the popularity of dark chocolate, which contains a good deal more cocoa by volume than traditional chocolate bars and evidence of dark chocolate being ‘heart healthy’ because of a study that shows its flavonoids inhibit the clumping or aggregation of platelets, which is a major cause of blood clots leading to stroke and heart attacks.

2, The Chinese are catching on to the chocolate thing and there are billions of them. (ie; If they start dipping their ‘scorpion-on-a-stick’ treat in chocolate, it’ll happen sooner than later. The UN Food and Agriculture Organization says over 2 billion people worldwide already supplement their diet with insects.

3, It tastes so friggin’ good and we can’t help ourselves.

You should never really run out of chocolate

There are 2 types of chocolate; the regular kind and ‘emergency’ chocolate which is sometimes hidden deep within the fridge in a jar marked ‘gravy’. Emergency chocolate is like getting a wet kiss from your geriatric aunt after she hands you a money filled birthday envelope. It’ll serve its purpose but there’s a bad aftertaste.

‘Emergency’ chocolate is just what it implies. Let’s say it’s late, the car has no gas and you can’t walk to an ‘open all night’ store and stock up. ‘Emergency’ chocolate is the 2 year old chocolate Easter bunny with no ears. It’s the gold foil wrapped chocolate Hanukkah ‘gelt coins’ from 5748. It could even be the last crumb of the dried out end of a brownie. All it does is stave off the cravings for the good stuff.

Let’s pray that chocolate loving scientists can divert attention from climate change and focus on a succulently fruitful cacao tree that can grow anywhere on the planet. It’s that important!