How many tons of chocolate does the world eat each year?

How to get close to this number

Multiply population by per-person consumption. Rich countries eat several kilos a head and much of the world eats very little, so a global average of around a kilo per person is realistic. Eight billion times a kilo gives millions of tonnes.

The per-capita leader is the detail that calibrates the spread: roughly nine kilos a year in one small European country, which is nine times the global average. Chocolate consumption tracks income and cold winters far more than it tracks proximity to cocoa.

The production geography is the inversion worth noticing: around seventy percent of the world's cocoa comes from West Africa, mostly from smallholdings of a few hectares, while consumption concentrates in wealthy countries that grow none. A commodity where growers and eaters are entirely separate populations is where the value capture question gets sharpest.