A second chance for the family farm
Born into a family of farmers in Maranhão, Farmer Cloves Rios, 38, grew up with seven siblings. As a child, he moved with his family to Pará, where his parents worked hard in the fields and attempted to grow various crops with little success. When they began cultivating cocoa, conditions improved slightly, but the family still struggled to move beyond subsistence farming.
In an effort to escape poverty, young Cloves left Novo Repartimento to study in Belém, the capital of Pará. However, the move did not bring the opportunities he had hoped for. Faced with new hardships, he was unable to continue his studies. In 2008, Cloves returned to Novo Repartimento. His father was no longer able to work, and his brothers had left the family property. Married to Alana and father to 10-year-old Rhadade and 5-year-old Yorhana, Cloves was looking for a viable way to support his family. He decided to give cocoa farming a second chance.
That opportunity came in 2016, when Cloves joined Solidaridad’s initiative to promote cocoa cultivation in agroforestry systems– aimed at improving family incomes while reducing deforestation.
“As soon as Solidaridad arrived with the project, we joined”, Cloves recalls. “Their proposal to offer on-site technical assistance was very good, because we wanted to know about things, but we didn’t have anyone to ask. They said they would help improve productivity and quality, and that’s how we became partners,” he says, reflecting the reality of Brazilian family farming. According to the 2017 Agricultural Census, current technical assistance and rural extension services only have the capacity to serve 18% of the national territory.
What began as a project serving 53 families has since grown into the largest non-public technical assistance and rural extension program for family farming in the state of Pará. Today, it serves 1,692 families, contributes to the conservation of over 18,000 hectares of conserved forests, and has helped reduce deforestation rates by 44% and greenhouse gas emissions by 34.5%.
Chocolate as a life changer
In 2023, Cloves and Alana created the chocolate brand Tuerê Land Cocoa. Following a bean-to-bar logic, they oversee the entire production process– from growing high-quality cocoa beans to packaging the bars for sale.
“We began the process of developing the brand by visiting high-quality chocolate festivals, always with the encouragement of Solidaridad. At these events, we saw other family producers making their own chocolate, which sparked the same desire in us. We started taking our brand to the festivals and today we are well-recognized in the region,” says Cloves.
He then goes on to describe the accolades that the chocolate has received. “Last year, we were among the ten best chocolates in the state of Pará and achieved fourth place in the ‘Best Origin Chocolate of the Amazon 2024’ category at Chocolat Amazônia. This was a great incentive to prove that we are on the right track.”
Between 2021 and 2025, the average cocoa yield among participants in the Amazônia Programme was 740 kg/ha, resulting in an average gross annual income of R$61,222 (~ 9,400 euros) per family. This productivity of the participants is in line with the average for Pará (750 kg/ha), exceeding the national average of 350 kg/ha, as well as Bahia’s average of 150 kg/ha– despite both states being Brazil’s main cocoa producers.
Satisfied with the turnaround he made in his life, Cloves recalls that he didn’t expect to get this far. “I only thought about increasing production, selling to the first middleman who came along, just to pay the bills. Making chocolate wasn’t even in our dreams, it was far from our reality,” he says. “I get emotional seeing the chocolate bars with my name on them, our service, our quality. This is the result of a partnership. I’m very honored and happy,” he comments.
Cloves adds that he doesn’t plan to stop. “The settlement (Tuerê) is a very promising region. I already dream of an agro-industry to process cocoa and other crops, diversify farming in our region, and add more value to family farming. It’s a region of farming families who deserve recognition and appreciation,” he concludes.
Terroir Tuerê and Forest Conservation
Named as one of the 50 best cocoa beans in the world, Terroir Tuerê – named after the rural settlement in the municipality of Novo Repartimento – is making history in the global production of fine cocoa and bean-to-bar chocolates. It has already won 37 national and international awards, fourteen gold medals, thirteen silver medals and ten bronze medals, for both cocoa beans and the chocolate bars made from them. Beyond the accolades, Terroir Tuerê stands out for its role in promoting forest conservation in a region facing severe environmental challenges.
The Amazon region accounts for less than 9% of Brazil’s GDP, yet it is responsible for more than half of the country’s greenhouse gas emissions– largely due to deforestation and burning. The challenge is not a lack of land, but rather the underutilization of areas that have already been deforested. Of the more than 86 million hectares that have been converted in the past, a significant part could be recovered or used more efficiently, especially through low-carbon agricultural and livestock practices.
The cocoa chain in Pará, growing at an annual rate of 9% per year for over a decade, is demonstrating that bioeconomy can be a vector for inclusion and conservation. Through agroforestry systems and quality-focused production, cocoa is proving to be a viable way to combine income generation with forest conservation.