2007-2008 ACADEMIC YEAR FOR CHOCOLATE,

This ha been a great academic year for chocolate in Universities in Europe and America, Here are some of the honours that chocolate has added to its credits.

American Chemical Society: Found a link of "love for chocolate" to a specific chemical signature that may be programmed into the metabolic system. It is detectable by laboratory tests,

It was found, as suspected that "lovers of chocolate" had a metobolic profile that involved low levels of LDL-cholestral(bad cholestrol). They also had slightly elevated levels of albumin(a benefical protein).

The amazing thing is that "lovers of chocolate" expressed this profile even when they ate no chocolate.

The gut microbes in "lovers of chocolate were also different from "non-lovers of chocolate."

For more information on the above study read the Nov.2 issue of the Journal of Proteome Research--if you dare!

German University Hospital, Cologne: dark chocolate can lower blood pressure.

University of California, Davis: chocolate can improve blood vessel function.

University of Nottingham: Chocolate improved cognitive skills by increasing blood flow to certain areas of the brain. As I said earlier eat some before taking an exam.

University of Chicago: Study claimed that those who had a chunk of chocolate generally were better disposed to others than those who had none. Wish we had flown some chunks of Silver Queen Chunky to the delegates of the recent WTO conference.

And Nestle announced the establishment of the Chocolate Centre of Excellence, dedicated to the development of luxury chocolate, at Broc. It will be operational in 2009. Persumably Nestle was encouraged by the "premiunisation" of Cailler, Baci, Nestle Noir and Perugina. Our great chocolatier Pierre Marcolini has been seconded to provide the inspiration.

I am beginning to fear that like like most common needs and joys of life, including air and water, chocolate too may eventually be priced far beyond our budgets. Hopefully Beng Beng may still be around at 10c a bar.

CHOCOLATE DURING HARD TIMES.

Times maybe a little tough with cost of living going up and up. But it not preventing Indonesians from eating chocolate. A source inside Mayora, quoting research, confided that one million people eat Beng Beng everyday. This caramel, wafer, rice crispie snack thrives not only by being a good snack but it seems to enjoy the loyalties passed on from the previous generation. It is alsoi believed that Beng Beng"s distribution has a wider geographical reach penetrating well into the rural areas. It nearest competitor Top has about half as many eaters daily. And an estimate is that there are about 400,000 Silver Queen eaters daily.Silver Queen has reigned for decades as the top chocolate bar in Indonesia. Kit-Kat has about half as many daily consumers.



As we all guess the 14 to 17 year olds(of course) and the over 50s make up the largest segment of chocolate or chocolate covered confectionary. The rest are evenly spread from 18 to 49. Over 60% of the consumers are in the middle and upper income groups. There are about 90million Indonesians who buy coinfectionary(chocolate, candies hard and soft and gum), frequently(within the last month).