Are There Heavy Metals in my Cacao?

Have you noticed the Proposition 65 warning on some bags of cacao powder from companies selling in California? While we commend California for informing consumers about foods that contain chemicals that can cause cancer, birth defects, or other reproductive harm, we’ve seen that this has brought more questions and concern to cacao users about just what heavy metals might be getting into their cacao. So, we are here to answer those questions! While we cannot cover all cacao, we can provide insight on how heavy metals might, and might not, get into your cacao and share the results from our tests of Kokoleka Collective’s Ceremonial Cacao.

Freshly harvested cacao pods.

What are Heavy Metals?

When we talk about heavy metals, we are not referring to the small amounts of metals like iron, copper, and zinc which are important for the functioning of your body. No, we are referring to metals with a high density that can be toxic at low concentrations. These are metals like lead, mercury, arsenic, nickel, thallium, and cadmium. How are they toxic? These metals can bind to your cells and prevent your organs from functioning, especially your vital organs like your brain and liver. Significant exposure to lead can damage the brain and nervous system, as well as, slow growth and development. Similarly, significant exposure to cadmium can lead to reproductive harm, birth defects, or lung cancer.

The most common ways we may be exposed to these metals is through contaminated water, seafood, cigarette smoke, topical creams, paints, concrete, metal machines, fertilizers, pesticides, and herbicides. More recently, it is begin discovered that, due to contaminated water, fertilizers, pesticides, herbicides, metal machines, and other harmful chemicals used in industrial farming, a variety of foods contain heavy metals as well. Unfortunately, simply removing fish from our diets is not the answer. Repeated exposure to food, water, and air containing high amounts of heavy metals can lead to heavy metal poisoning. Consult with your doctor and get tested for heavy metal poisoning if you experience regular abdominal pain, diarrhea, feeling weak, nausea or vomiting, numbness or prickly sensations in your hands and feet, anemia, memory loss, or difficulty breathing.

The Culprit of the Craze: Industrialized Cacao

Small-farm cacao growing.

Due to the rise of water pollution, air pollution, and industrial farming practices that use pesticides, herbicides, and metal machines, heavy metals have made their way into the dark chocolate bars you buy in stores. Companies like Lindt and Dove have more cadmium and lead in their chocolate than Godiva and Hershey’s. Unfortunately, even some Trader Joe’s chocolate bars have been found to have levels of cadmium and lead that exceed California’s limitations. If you cannot find this information through the company in question, do a quick browse of consumer reports and you’ll likely be able to find this information. While it may be hard to avoid regional pollutants in air and water, opting for chocolate farmed on small family-run farms using small-batch methods helps to reduce the level of heavy metals in chocolate as these families are focused on natural farming methods which don’t use harmful chemicals and utilize hands rather than industrialized machines that contain metals.

What’s in the Soil?

One of the farmers partnered with Kokoleka Collective showing the soil.

It really all starts with the soil. Good soil means a good harvest. Cadmium naturally lives in the soil cacao trees grow in mainly due to volcanic activity. However, cadmium in soils increases when fertilizers, herbicides, and pesticides are used either on the soil or locally in the area. This means that cadmium is transported to the cocoa beans through the cacao tree. While it’s almost unavoidable to have a level of zero cadmium in chocolate, the better the condition of the soil and air, the less cadmium you will find. Lead enters chocolate in the fermentation and transportation phases due to being wet and exposed to surfaces and dust that contain traces of lead. While many small farms are careful not to dry the wet beans on roads, concrete surfaces, or direct contact with the ground (which contain lead), industrial farms tend to utilize these surfaces for drying.

Fermentation, Nature’s Natural Cleanse

Due to increasing air and water pollution worldwide, there is concern about the possibility that heavy metals in foods will increase. Fortunately, small-batch methods of harvesting and preparing cacao, specifically the fermentation process with the help of the sun, can aid in reducing heavy metal levels. A crucial part of activating the taste and nutritional elements of cacao is the fermentation process. Fermentation also acts as a built-in cleanser for these unwanted heavy metals making their way into our chocolate. In a study released this past January on the Effect of fermentation stages on the nutritional and mineral bioavailability of cacao beans (2023), it was found that fermentation, through an outward migration, reduces levels of lead and nickel by about 50%-60%. Plus, fermenting cacao beans enhances the bioavailability of minerals imperative for our nutrition.

Kokoleka Collective’s Heavy Metal Analysis:

Results, in Spanish, from our the testing of our cacao.

Looking at the ‘Resultado’ section, we can see that the levels of arsenic, cadmium, and lead in micrograms in Kokoleka Collective’s cacao are well below the acceptable levels of daily lead intake indicated by The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (2.2 micrograms for children and 8.8 micrograms for adults). Heavy metal levels in our cacao also fall below acceptable EU regulations of cadmium (.80 ppm) and lead (.225ppm) While it’s not always possible to avoid getting cadmium and lead in your food, you can protect your body from absorbing heavy metals by increasing your calcium and iron intake and conducting regular heavy metal detoxes.