The Story of Bantu Chocolate and a Better Cocoa Future

Easter has come and gone, but we have been stuck with the thought of those chocolate eggs and their noticeably higher price tags. Behind the rising cost lies a deeper, bitter truth: climate change, extreme weather, and disease have devastated cocoa crops in West Africa, the region that produces around 80% of the world’s cocoa (J.P. Morgan Insights).

Behind every chocolate bar lies a bittersweet story built on a system shaped by exploitation and neglect. The cocoa industry still depends on a supply chain that rewards the few while leaving the real workers, often in the Global South, with barely enough to live on.

To understand what this means on the ground, we spoke to Veronique Mbida, founder of Bantu Chocolate and a Restor partner, who’s building a new kind of cocoa economy in Cameroon, rooted in transparency, equity, and collective heritage.

Between different worlds 

Born in Cameroon, raised in France, and later based in Rio de Janeiro, Veronique Mbida has long moved between cultures. With a background in marketing, she became aware of how global trade often overlooks the richness of local farming communities and ecosystems, reducing them to raw material sources rather than equal players in the value chain. When her mother called to ask for help planning the family’s cacao sales operations, Veronique stepped in, bringing her multilingual and strategic skills to the table. That sparked a vision for something different: chocolate that could be traced from bean to bar, where the consumer is empowered and reconnected with the people and places behind the product.

Bitter roots

Historically, cocoa’s journey had been one of exploitation and destruction. Cacao was first introduced to West Africa in the 18th century, at a time when European demand was rising—and colonizers were reshaping African economies for export agriculture. Cash crops like cocoa, coffee, and cotton were planted in monocultures, displacing traditional farming systems and worsening food insecurity.

From those roots until today, the legacy lingers. Despite feeding a multibillion-dollar chocolate industry, most cocoa farmers still live in poverty, earning less than 3% of the final product’s value. The increasingly intensified farming methods, as a result of rocketing demand for chocolate, have led to a plant that is depleting and drying up soils and has little resilience to the impacts of climate change.

"Chocolate is joy," says Veronique. "And joy should never come at the expense of people or the planet."

A new ecosystem for chocolate 

Bantu Chocolate is redefining the cocoa supply chain. Rather than working within a system that often leaves farmers behind, they’re creating a new model where farmers are owners, decision-makers, and equitable beneficiaries of their work, offering consumers a product that’s both ethically produced and sustainably sourced.

Bantu Chocolate is reshaping cocoa farming in Cameroon. Employees on the Bantu farm are paid significantly higher than the Fairtrade standard. As farm owners, Bantu focuses on sustainable farming practices that ensure the long-term viability of cacao production, which is threatened by climate change and biodiversity loss. Bantu is investing in the development of its team’s knowledge of sustainable practices, helping them adopt techniques that protect the future of cacao farming. This long-term investment model, prioritizing sustainability over short-term profit, aims to elevate the position of cocoa workers within the global supply chain while contributing to the preservation of cacao for future generations.

This isn't just about making chocolate "less bad" – it's about demonstrating a fundamentally different possibility for how global agriculture could function in a more equitable future. It challenges the assumption that exploitation is the inevitable cost of affordable products.

Cocoa’s journey is often sanitized by many of the big chocolate producers, and as consumers, it’s easy for us to close our eyes to the ill-treatment behind our treats. Bantu doesn’t want you to feel guilty for enjoying chocolate: they want you to savor a high-quality product whilst knowing where it’s come from, how the product is creating stable livelihoods and a positive impact for generations to come, and that it’s regenerating the land by improving soil fertility, increasing carbon sequestration, and reducing reliance on synthetic chemicals. This is why they actively seek funding to amplify their impact and sustain this vital work. Every dollar invested creates lasting change.

When someone in Los Angeles, London, or Brussels chooses our products, they're catalyzing a ripple effect that transforms both landscapes and lives. Through radical transparency about our farming practices and supply chain, we transform everyday consumers into conscious changemakers who drive demand for a sustainable impact in the food systems.

Powered by transparency

As a founder, Veronique has used environmental data available on Restor to refine farming practices on the Bantu farm in Cameroon, improving soil health, sequestering carbon, and increasing biodiversity. This data may also help create future opportunities in carbon markets and climate financing, with the potential to provide long-term, stable income for farming communities in the future.

A better future for cocoa is already growing. Shop now