STRONG CHOCOLATE AND THE FRAGILE ECONOMY.

Employees of Lehman Brothers, it seems, are rushing to use the pre-pay canteen cards in buying hundreds of bars of chocolate.Before the permanently leave the building, as it were. Also roasted coffee and other non-perishables. So reported the Financial times early this week. Obviously this is very wise of Lehman bankers. Chocolate can be a very good anti-depressant.

We in Indonesia felt the shock waves this week. There were lots of stock brokers on Monday who downgraded from the posher restaurants at Pacific Place(opposite the Stock Exchange) to Wendy's and the Food Court.

As someone who sells chocolate I was somewhat comforted to hear that Mintel reports chocolate consumption will continue on track with an annual increase of 4%(US projection) in the next six years. The market research company says that chocolate is recession-proof. People, said a spokesman of the company, might cut back but they wont give up on their daily indulgences, like chocolate.

In Europe sales of dark chocolate hit 106million Euros. This is an astonishing increase of 96% between 2005 and 2007. A five percent growth is expected in 2008.

In Indonesia, fortunately this is the peak season and supermarkets report sales of chocolate confectionery, especially in multi-packs and chocolate coated wafers and biscuits are up 60% over the July sales.

Here we, expect for the upper-income groups, indulgence does not extend to chocolates. People simply switch from more expensive bars to chocolate snacks. This makes sense during rising food prices(60% of the average Indonesian household expenditure goes to food)as a bar of a 200gm chocolate bar can cost as much as two days of family meals for a lower middle income family.

The good thing is the stronger activity during recession from home food industries.
Baking and chocolate snacks produced by home industries find good acceptance in the neighbourhood. Thankfully they do well enough to generate cash-flow. If they ever collapse they cannot expect the sort of concern or assistance as Lehman's or AIG received.Although you and I know, who is the more deserving.