This picture taken on November 18, 2013 shows Vincent Mourou (L) and Samuel Maruta, co-founders of Vietnam's first artisan chocolate maker Marou, inspecting cocoa fruits as they visit a farmer's garden growing cocoa trees in Go Cong Tay district, southern province of Tien Giang. From designer jeans to catfish filets, the Made in Vietnam label is found on many low-cost goods the world over -- but on delicious artisan chcolate? Not so much. - AFP
"The cacao sector in Vietnam is really at a crossroads - it could go for quality or quantity," said Vien Kim Cuong, program manager for Swiss NGO Helvetas, which works with cacao farmers on certification.
The country is well-known for cheap agricultural exports like coffee - it provides 50 percent of the world's low-end Robusta beans - and catfish so cheap it is repeatedly hit by US anti-dumping measures.
Marou and Puratos Grand-Place want the government to take a different, more upmarket route with the cacao sector - they are trying to add value locally and build a reputation for Vietnamese luxury chocolate.
"We transform an agricultural product, the cacao bean plus sugar, into a high-quality chocolate that we position as a premium product on the export market," said Safarian - whose Made in Vietnam chocolate is found in top restaurants from Paris to Tokyo.
For Marou co-founder Samuel Maruta, setting up an artisan chocolate company in Vietnam - not known for cacao, chocolate or even high-quality export goods - was a risk.
But the pair have successfully positioned their Vietnamese single-origin chocolate as part of a growing bean-to-bar revolution, a rebellion against homogeneity in an industry dominated by major players like Kraft and Italy's Ferrero.
Mass-produced chocolate can be "incredibly soulless," said Maruta, a world apart from the rich, fruity, spicy notes found in a bar of the company's 78 percent dark chocolate.
From their Ho Chi Minh City-based factory, they're now exporting close to two tons of chocolate a month, to some 15 countries.
The pair want Vietnam "to push quality cacao, so that Vietnamese cacao is known for quality and not quantity," Maruta said.
Officials at state department VinaCacao said they aimed to increase cacao production some five-fold by 2020, but declined to provide further details.
Calling for quality
Major buyers including industry leader MARS are eager for Vietnam to grow more higher-quality "certified" beans - MARS has pledged to use only certified beans by 2020.
"Vietnam will play a role in providing certified quality beans to Mars," which is working locally to train farmers and research new cacao strains, MARS Vietnam cocoa development manager Dinh Hai Lam told AFP.
The only other country to go into cacao production in recent years is Indonesia, which focuses only on producing a high volume of low-end, unfermented beans.
Cacao can be a good earner for farmers - but only if they can get a premium for their beans, and the premium is based on the quality, Safarian said.
Ironically, the people who are the most difficult to convince about the quality of Vietnamese chocolate are... Vietnamese.
"The Vietnamese consumer does not trust the product of his own country yet," Safarian said, referring to consumers' preference for imported goods which are perceived as higher quality.
"This will change," he said. "You cannot approach the chocolate market in Vietnam as you approach it in France or Belgium," he said, adding that while there is not likely to be much of a market for praline, the emerging middle class is already developing a taste for chocolate.
"Being in this business for 30 years, I have still never met anyone who doesn't like chocolate at first bite."
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