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Madagascar has in fact a long history of chocolate production, dating back to the early years of the French colonial times, 1937 to be precise. In those days, Madagascar was a major cocoa exporter to a metropolitan France. Today Madagascar's cocoa production is tiny in comparison to the Ivory Coast for example which produce about 38% of the world's cocoa, while almost all cocoa grown in Madagascar come from an area about 50-kilometre in radius and represent less than 1% of the world's cocoa production. The farming areas are within the [[Sambirano]] region, named after a river by the same name that runs from the foothills of Madagascar's highest peak and into the Indian Ocean. The Sambirano riverbed and its surrounding cocoa plantations are enriched with nutrients of the soil through annual floods. Unlike cocoa producing regions in many other countries, the area around Sambirano is unique in that it yields cocoa all year round. There are plenty of Criollo - the best quality cocoa, Forastero - the most common variety used for bulk cocoa, and Trinitario - a cross between the former two.