A long-running civil war on the often fraught island of Bougainville in Papua New Guinea is one of the major reasons its well-regarded cocoa beans stopped being exported to Australia.
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But relative peace in recent times and efforts by Australian authorities in February saw what is believed to be the first direct shipment of cocoa to Australia from Bougainville in more than 20 years.
And the shipment was to make chocolate bars in Canberra.
Garran couple Li Peng Monroe and Peter Channells run the still-new local chocolate company Jasper+Myrtle, a bespoke operation in which they roast the beans to hand make the chocolate bars from home.
They sold their first bar in March last year.
The couple was invited to the inaugural Bougainville Chocolate Festival in mid-2016, the event organised by the Australian Centre for International Agricultural Research.
In a Boys Own Adventure kind of trip that involved several plane trips and hours driving through the jungle, Ms Monroe and Mr Channells finally got to the chocolate festival in the middle of an island paradise.
Dr Richard Markham from ACIAR said the chocolate festival was seen as a turning point in the re-birth of the cocoa industry in Bougainville.
The dislocation of recent decades meant Bougainville's cocoa producers had lost their links to buyers and the market.
The chocolate festival introduced chocolate makers from Australians to cocoa growers in PNG.
Australian officials also helped to give Bougainville cocoa growers access to the technical assistance, training and technologies they need to develop the industry and link to new markets
Ms Monroe and Mr Channells ended up making contact with a gold-medal-winning farmer whose beans produced the best chocolate of the festival.
That farmer and others are now supplying beans to Jasper + Myrtle.
The label is this weekend debuting three products made using the Bougainville beans: the Black Opal (80 per cent dark), Twilight (63 per cent dark milk) and their 66 per cent PNG dark chocolate now with Bougainville beans.
Canberrans can taste the new chocolate bars at the Canberra Region Farmer Market at EPIC and The Forage Market in Barton this Saturday, and at the Southside Farmers Market at Canberra College on Sunday.
Ms Monroe said the Bougainville cocoa beans had always been regarded as high quality and produced a unique-tasting chocolate.
"It's got a fruitiness in it and quite an intense flavour," she said.
Ms Monroe said the help of ACIAR, an Australian Government agency, had been invaluable.
"It has taken a constant effort and involved many people, especially those working on the ACIAR Bougainville project, to make the first shipment of Bougainville cocoa beans possible, and we are very grateful to all," she said.
"Bringing together individual cocoa bean growers and boutique chocolatemakers such as Jasper+ Myrtle Chocolates provides direct feedback to growers on what the market wants and stimulates both industries. A win-win."
