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This chapter looks at the first of several major diseases of cacao, black pod, which is responsible for huge losses in cacao production every year. It deals with the pathogens responsible, Phytophthora palmivora and Phytophthora megakarya, looking at their biology, and how understanding their biology and ecology can help in devising methods to control the disease and minimize its impact. The chapter takes us through the history of black pod research and the people involved in trying to understand this devastating disease. The need for vigilance is highlighted, since P. megakarya, which causes large losses in cacao production in West Africa, has not yet spread to other cacao-growing regions of the world.

In this chapter, the deadly witches’ broom disease is unmasked. Its true identity took considerable time to unravel, but the perseverance of researchers paid off and it turned out that the agent responsible is Moniliophthora perniciosa, a close relative of the frosty pod rot pathogen. The pathogen spread across the northern areas of South America and into the Caribbean, causing devastation from which cacao production in some countries never fully recovered. The major cacao-growing region of Bahia in Brazil remained free of the disease for a long time, but all that changed in the late 1980s. The discovery of witches’ broom there had far-reaching consequences for cacao production in Brazil, effects which are still felt today. This chapter looks at the efforts made to understand the pathogen and the disease it causes, and how this research informs work aimed at tackling the disease.

This chapter looks at two diseases affecting the vascular system of the cacao tree: vascular streak dieback, caused by the fungus Ceratobasidium theobromae, and wilt disease, caused by the fungus Ceratocystis cacaofunesta. Both diseases are considered as serious threats to cacao production and their impact has already been considerable and severe. Vascular streak dieback nearly destroyed the cacao industry in Papua New Guinea and is mercifully restricted to Indonesia, Malaysia, and South-East Asia, while Ceratocystis wilt has been reported in several countries in South and Central America, where it has caused substantial crop losses. The chapter examines the research being undertaken to better understand these diseases and how best to tackle them.

This chapter focuses on the cacao farmers of the Soconusco region of Chiapas, Mexico. The Soconusco region is ideally suited for cacao production; in prehistoric times and historic times the region was one of the chief cacao-producing areas of the Mesoamerica. However, by the turn of the nineteenth century, other agricultural products dominated the cacao production of Soconusco. Bananas, coffee, cotton, and mangos surpassed cacaos as the primary export products. This chapter examines the decline of cacao production and the cacao industry in the Soconusco region. The chapter begins by briefly reviewing cacao cultivation and the environment during the pre-Columbian period in the Soconusco. It also discusses evidence from the Colonial period and the nineteenth century as well as the contemporary trends and issues being faced by Soconusco cacao farmers today.

This chapter discusses changing trends in the production of cacao plants in Izalcos, El Salvador, during the sixteenth century. The use of cacao as money in Mesoamerica is connected to long-distance trade, marketplace exchange, and the need for formalized media of exchange. These phenomena and ther change in the use of cacao were associated with the emergence of state, urbanism, and stratified society during the Middle to Late Formative periods. By the time of the Spanish Conquest, the use of cacao as a currency was also widespread in Mesoamerica, from Central Mexico, Yucatan, and Nicaragua. One of the participants of this system was the Nahua Pipils of the Izalcos region. This chapter focuses on the emergence of private ownership and inheritance of cacao trees and orchards in sixteenth-century Izalcos. Discussion in this chapter includes the history of cacao use in Izalcos, the social and political organization of Izalcos, and land tenure and household production of cacao.

Chapter 5 draws on a broad range of evidence to develop a view of what the agricultural landscape of the Rio Hondo basin, now on the Belize-Mexican border, must have looked like in the heavily populated Classic era landscape. The authors use Contact period Spanish accounts to describe trade in agricultural products–especially cacao, but also achiote and vanilla–that were particularly prized from this region. Ten years of research on the drained field agricultural systems, such as the Chan Cahal fields near Blue Creek, identified the timespan for commercial level production, and computer assisted analysis of aerial and satellite photographs are beginning to document the massive scale of this enterprise.