The chocolate is made from the seeds of the cocoa tree (Theobroma cocoa). It is originally from Central America, although today the main producers are actually from other regions: the ivory coast, Ghana and Indonesia are the three largest producers.
The Aztecs were very passionate about the cocoa “beans” (which, of course, are not grains, but are the seeds of cocoa or cocoa pod), they prepare a cold chocolate drink mixed with corn puree, spiced with chili, Ienibahar and vanilla. Because the cocoa tree cannot grow in the mountainous areas where the Aztec lives, the cocoa beans were particularly appreciated by them. It is said that the Mayan and Aztec used used cocoa berries as a exchange currency.
The Spaniards brought the chocolate home from Mexico in the sixteenth century, after the conquest of the Aztec Empire, which is why the current names of the substance derive from the Aztec word, “xocolāt”.
When it was first brought to Europe for the first time, chocolate was a drink
When it was first brought to Europe, chocolate was a drink – in the original Aztec style. However, until then, the Spaniards from Mexico had removed the hot pepper (mosques!) And had added sugar or honey to the original Aztec recipe. Chocolate (drinking) has begun to spread rapidly in Europe since the seventeenth century, writes Ha-Joon Chang in his book “Edition Economics”.
The chocolate was only solidified in 1847. Fry's in Bristol, one of the then triumvirates of British confectioners (together with Cadbury's in Birmingham and Rowntree's in York), invented the first mass chocolate tablet.
Although the practice of mixing chocolate drinks with milk has existed for several centuries, the initial chocolate tablet was made of dark chocolate – and not from milk chocolate.
This is not due to the fact that dark chocolate was more popular than milk chocolate, but the fact that all previous attempts to add milk to chocolate tablets had failed due to excess resulting liquid, which allowed mold development.
This problem was solved in 1875 by two Swiss. Daniel Peter, a chocolate, created the first milk chocolate tablets by giving up fresh milk and using powdered milk, invented by Henri Nestlé, the wizard of milk -based food technology. The two later united their forces with others to form the Nestlé food giant.
In 1879, Lindt & Sprüngli, another Swiss company, did the following jump in the manufacture of chocolate inventing the “aware” process, which improves the texture and aroma of chocolate by prolonged mechanical mixing of the ingredients. Switzerland has become a synonym for high quality chocolate.
Many people believe that chocolate is the only thing that Switzerland produces – except for ridiculously expensive watches that can only allow oligarchs, bankers and sports stars. The widespread opinion is that it is a country that produces few things and lives in services.
Another negative interpretation is that Switzerland is a country that earns its existence by managing the black money deposited by the third world dictators in its secret banks and selling bad taste souvenirs (which are probably manufactured in China), US and Japanese tourists.
Another interpretation is that the country is a model for the post-industrial economy, in which prosperity is based on services, such as finances and luxury tourism, rather than production.
The speech of the post-industrial era, originally from the 1970s, starts from the idea that people want more and more fine things as they become richer.
Once people fill their stomachs, agriculture declines. When they meet other more basic needs, such as clothing and furniture, they go to more sophisticated consumer goods, such as electronics and cars.
When most people have these things, the demand of consumers moves to services – restaurants in the city, theater, tourism, financial services and so on. At that time, the industry begins to decrease, and the services become the dominant economic sector, starting the post-industrial era of human economic progress.
This vision of the post-industrial era has gained ground in the 1990s, when almost all the rich economies began to see a decrease in the importance of the processing industry and an increase in the importance of services, both in terms of production and employment-this process is known as “deindustrialization”.
Especially with the appearance of China as the largest industrial nation in the world, the supporters of the post-industrial society have argued that the processing industry has become what became low technology and low salaries, such as China, while high quality services, such as finances, IT services and business consulting, represented the future, especially for rich countries.
And in this speech, Switzerland, sometimes together with Singapore, was presented as proof that countries can maintain a very high standard of living through specialization in services. Convinced of this argument and inspired by the examples of Switzerland and Singapore, some developing countries, such as India and Rwanda, have even tried to jump more or less over industrialization and develop their savings becoming specialized exporters of high quality services.
Unfortunately for the supporters of the post -industrial society, Switzerland is in fact the most industrialized economy in the world, producing the largest amount of manual production per person.
We do not see many products “manufactured in Switzerland” partially because the country is small (only around 9 million inhabitants), but also because it is specialized in what economists call “production goods” – machines, precision equipment and industrial chemicals – which ordinary consumers do not see.
It is interesting to note that Singapore, another alleged post-industrial success story, is the second most industrialized economy in the world. The use of Switzerland and Singapore as models of post-industrial economy of services is as-how do I say? – The use of Norway and Finland to promote the beach holidays.
Post-industrial supporters misunderstand the nature of recent economic changes. What determines deindustrialization is mainly changing productivity, not changing demand.
This aspect is easier to observe in relation to employment. Because the manufacturing process has become more and more mechanized, we do not need the same number of workers to produce the same amount of manufacturer production.
With the help of cars and even industrial robots, today's workers can produce many multiples of what their parents could produce.
Half a century ago, the processing industry occupied about 40% of the labor force in the rich countries, but today the same quantity-and sometimes even higher-production is produced by 10-20% of the workforce.
The dynamics of production is slightly more complicated. It is true that the importance of the processing industry in the national economy has decreased, while that of services has grown in these countries.
However, this did not happen because the demand for services has increased more than the demand for goods made in absolute terms, as they would like to believe the supporters of the post -industrial discourse. It happened mainly because services become relatively more expensive, given the faster productivity increase in industry than in services.
Just think about how computers and mobile phones have become much cheaper in the last two decades, compared to haircuts or eating in the city.
The ability to produce competitively manufactured goods remains the most important determining factor in a country's living
Many of the high productivity services that should replace the processing industry – such as financial, transport and business services (for example, management, engineering, design) – cannot exist without the processing sector, as this is their main customer.
These services seem “new” just because they used to be provided internally by the producing companies (and, therefore, considered as production of the processing sector), but are now provided by companies specialized in these services (and, therefore, considered as production of the services sector). This is why countries with strong processing industries, such as Switzerland and Singapore, also have strong service industries (although the reverse is not necessarily true).
Moreover, the processing industry is still the main source of technological innovation. Even in the US and the United Kingdom, where the processing industry represents only about 10% of economic production, 60-70% of research and development (C&D) is carried out by the processing sector. The figure is 80-90% in more production oriented economies, such as Germany or South Korea.
The secret of Swiss success lies in the most powerful manufacturing sector in the world
The belief that we are now living in an era of the post-industrial economy has been particularly harmful to the US and the United Kingdom. Since the 1980s, these countries, especially the United Kingdom, have neglected their manufacturer sector under the illusion that their decline is a positive sign that their national economies make a transition from an industrial economy to a post-industrial economy. This gave the decision-makers a convenient excuse to do nothing about the decline of the manufacturer sector.
Even if the only product “manufactured in Switzerland” you bought is chocolate (most likely, unless you live in Switzerland), do not be fooled by this.
The secret of Swiss success lies in the most powerful manufacturing sector in the world and not in things like the banking system and luxury tourism, as we usually believe. Indeed, even the Swiss reputation in the field of chocolate comes from the ingenuity of its manufacturing sector (invention of powdered milk, creating milk chocolate and developing the technology).
It is not due to his competence in the service industry – to say, the ability of his banks to come up with sophisticated payment plans for rates for chocolate tablet buyers or the ability of his advertising agencies to make an elegant chocolate marketing campaign.
