> Generally, cadmium primarily gets into chocolate pre-harvest as the cacao plant pulls it up from the soil, while lead is a post-harvest contaminant, primarily from handling of wet beans, such as from dust and soil that gets on the cacao beans as they are dried outdoors.
> Simply improving manufacturing processes—removing contaminants during processing and cleaning—can easily reduce lead levels, and some companies are doing a relatively better job at this than others.
> But cadmium is a little more difficult. The metal is naturally found in volcanic soil and can spread into agricultural areas via mining, phosphate fertilizers, and municipal sludge. High cadmium levels are almost exclusively found in cacao beans grown in South America, with beans grown in West Africa showing little contamination.
As much as I don't want cadmium in my cadbury, if it's coming from volcanic soil and not from negligent processing, then for some reason I find myself not caring as much. They should address the mining run-off issue though.
> Simply improving manufacturing processes—removing contaminants during processing and cleaning—can easily reduce lead levels, and some companies are doing a relatively better job at this than others.
> But cadmium is a little more difficult. The metal is naturally found in volcanic soil and can spread into agricultural areas via mining, phosphate fertilizers, and municipal sludge. High cadmium levels are almost exclusively found in cacao beans grown in South America, with beans grown in West Africa showing little contamination.
As much as I don't want cadmium in my cadbury, if it's coming from volcanic soil and not from negligent processing, then for some reason I find myself not caring as much. They should address the mining run-off issue though.