By Esperanza Nesbitt

When I first began working at Dandelion in 2019, we were asked on Orientation Day what our first memories of chocolate were. Having grown up on a cacao farm in the village of San Pedro Columbia in southern Belize, there was one memory that stuck out more than others: Every May, for nearly two decades, the Toledo District has put on Cacao Fest (now called the Toledo Chocolate Festival) — a celebration of chocolate, and the ultimate opportunity for children to compete for exciting, chocolatey prizes. 

At maybe six years old, enticed by the potential of sweet treats, I entered a chocolate drawing competition. Inspired by our farm, I drew someone walking through a cacao grove, bucket in one hand and a machete in the other. In the trees perched a pair of woodpeckers, known to drill holes in the pods and wait for the insects attracted by the juicy fruit.

As we tacked our finished drawings to a board, I was filled with dread. The other children had drawn mugs of hot cocoa, or chocolate-covered bananas, with perfect lines and glossy brown colored pencils. My landscape looked messy and raw by comparison. It hadn’t occurred to me to draw anything but cacao, and I felt embarrassed by my farm kid drawing. The judges, however, loved my drawing, and I won second place. At the end of the day, I took home several bars of chocolate, a box of sidewalk chalk, and the first inkling of pride in my connection to cacao. 

For the past several years, I’ve lived on the other end of the chocolate line. My days at the 16th Street café are filled with hot chocolates and roasted beans. The empty Maya Mountain cocoa bean sacks in the factory remind me how far we’ve both come, and keep me connected to the cacao farms I left behind. When I first heard of the wildfires in Belize, I wasn’t concerned. There have been fires before. Then another fire sprang up. And another. A week passed, and where I expected reprieve, there was none. 

Every phone call home told of another farm completely lost, of the lack of government help, of air too smoky to breathe from several miles away. Many residents and farmers took it upon themselves to fight the fires as best as they could. It all seemed too horrible to be real, and I felt impossibly far away and helpless.

After more than a month of battling fires, the rain we all hoped for finally came. The fires were extinguished, and the time to assess damages arrived. As of early June, the Caribbean Disaster Emergency Management Agency estimated that 10,000 acres have burnt, and 442 farmers across 33 villages have self-reported to the Ministry of Agriculture the loss of 67,150 cacao trees. We’ve learned that more than 35 cacao farms have been completely destroyed, while several others have been damaged. And it isn’t just cacao farms — other crops affected include corn, cardamom, fruit trees, and timber. More reports trickle in daily, all painting the same devastating picture. 

Several farmers in the affected area sell their beans to Maya Mountain Cacao, with whom Dandelion’s been partnering since 2013. Maya Mountain has a centralized fermentary — they connect small-scale cacao growers in Belize to the international specialty cocoa market. Located in Toledo, they were the first company within Belize to purchase wet beans from farmers.

For the farmers in southern Belize, this rainy season will be spent building cacao nurseries, and planting new cacao trees. It takes approximately five years for cacao trees to begin bearing fruit, with a peak growing period between 10 and 30 years. We’re looking at a long road to recovery.

Sitting here in my San Francisco apartment, I saw the opportunity to link two things that have always been connected: cacao farms and the craft chocolate world. Finally, my feelings of helplessness have turned into something hopeful. Uncommon Cacao and Maya Mountain Cacao have set up a GoFundMe fire-relief fundraiser. To contribute to the fire-recovery efforts, we’re donating 50 percent of sales from each Maya Mountain, Belize bar purchased throughout the month of July. We hope you’ll join us in contributing to the region’s fire-relief efforts.