Blog Contributor:

Michael Gerson

Cocoa can save the world

Jan 27th, 2012 10:17 AM UTC
By Michael Gerson

Senior ONE Adviser Michael Gerson is on the ground in the Democratic Republic of Congo. In this blog post, he writes about the benefits of cocoa crops on the country’s economy.

A farmer from the Greenhouse project in Beni separates raw cacao beans from an opened cacao pod to be washed, fermented, dried, and shipped.

We traveled down dirt roads near the town of Beni, in eastern Congo, close to the Ugandan border. Militias are active in the region, so our group was protected by an armed escort. Interactions at checkpoints along the road are unpredictable. In the town of Beni itself, a curfew is imposed each night at sunset.

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