This could be serious! the world is running out of chocolate.

Two of the worlds largest chocolate manufacturers, Mars and Barry Callebaut are anticipating chocolate shortages in coming years.

They say that the industry can't keep up with how much chocolate the world wants to eat – and brace yourself people, experts say it’s only going to get worse.

Last year they reported that the demand for chocolate was roughly 70,000 metric tons more cocoa than produced – a difference the industry expects to widen. By 2020, Mars and Barry Callebaut predict that we will want 1 million more metric tons of chocolate than the industry will be able to churn out. By 2030, the figure could swell to 2 million metric tons, the paper reports.

So, what’s going on and how can we fix it?!? Crops of cocoa have been suffering due to dry weather in West Africa, the biggest cocoa producer in the world, and a fungal disease that has wiped out around a third of global coca production. It’s similar to the problems in the coffee industry, where a fungus threatens to drag down the global production of coffee by as mush as 40%

Increased demand has also played a role in potential shortages. With chocolate consumption increasing in countries like India and China, demand for cocoa beans in Asia has risen 29 percent over the last five years. Plus, the Washington Post says the rising popularity of dark chocolate means more cocoa is used per serving than ever before in the era of the milk chocolate bar.

And it gets worse, the chocolate industry relies primarily on small farms with increasingly elderly farmers and disease-prone aged trees. If the next generation wants to enjoy chocolate, a new generation of farmers is going to have to step up.

So naturally enough, chocolate makers are raising their prices. In the U.S. Hershey announced a price hike, and a little closer to home Mars is following suit.

So what can we do? .....Move to West Africa and start cocoa farming or curb our enthusiasm for dark chocolate and go easy on the Quality Streets this Christmas time- lets make the collective effort people!

@MyraHayes