Guatemala

Guatemala has a deep cacao heritage rooted in Maya civilisation, where cacao served as both ritual substance and currency. Today it is a small producer on the global scale, but cacao is an important smallholder crop and the country is recognised by the ICCO as a partial fine-flavour origin.

Production is spread across several departments. Alta Verapaz in the north, including the Lachuá area near its national park, is among the leading zones and is farmed largely by Q'eqchi' Maya families; the municipality of Cahabón is a notable cacao centre where producers organise through cooperative federations. Izabal, on the Caribbean lowlands around Río Dulce and Livingston, and Suchitepéquez on the Pacific piedmont round out the main producing regions. Cacao is typically grown in shaded agroforestry plots interplanted with cardamom, coffee, plantain and timber.

Genetically, cultivated Guatemalan cacao is predominantly admixed, mixing Trinitario and Criollo-type material, though some farms retain Criollo-leaning trees consistent with the region's ancient cultivation history. Much of the modern sector was rebuilt through development projects from around 2005 onward, and the country has a growing export trade in organic and fine cacao alongside a domestic chocolate tradition.