During the 20th century, a devastating disease called Coffee Wilt Disease (CWD) spread across Africa, reducing yields, destroying millions of coffee trees and costing millions of USD in lost earnings for producers (Flood, 2009). The disease has also contributed to a decline in the revenues of several African nations. CWD reached epidemic proportions twi…
In the 17th century, markets in Europe were rapidly expanding and cocoa spread to most islands in the Caribbean and subsequently to mainland Venezuela and Colombia. In the same century, the Spanish succeeded in transferring a few live plants to Manila in the Philippines. Cocoa cultivation gradually spread southward through the East Indies, and ultimately also to Sri Lanka in the 19th century. A…