READING PASSAGE 3 You should spend about 20 minutes on Questions 27-40, which are based on Reading Passage 3 below. Black Gold Dark chocolate used to be an acquired taste. The trouble is, we've all acquired it. As cocoa prices soar, and a shortage looms, our changing tastes could be threatening the very source of our pleasure. A 25% jump in dark chocolate sales in the UK pretty much speaks for itself. As a nation we are turning our backs on the bland taste of milk chocolate, which is often saturated with vegetable oil. Dark chocolate now dominates counters in many supermarkets. Chocoholics should brace themselves. Fears over a global chocolate shortage have sparked a run on the dark stuff on world cocoa markets that has pushed the price up of cacao beans (used to make cocoa) to their highest level for more than two years. The price of cocoa futures, which is how the beans are traded on world commodity markets, has climbed steadily since last November, reviving fears of the cocoa crisis of 2002 that forced major manufacturers such as Nestle to hike the price of some of its chocolate bars. Although speculators have been fingered for pushing the price of cocoa higher, British chocolate aficionados must share at least some of the blame for the run on the bean. Soaring demand for dark chocolate in the UK has put a rocket under the global price of cacao beans, compounding the impact of a severe drought in West Africa, which is home to much of the world's cacao bean supplies. Consumers are doing the same thing in chocolate as in the rest of the food market. They are trading up and being more discerning about what they buy. All of the country's top supermarket chains have added new premium dark chocolate varieties to their own-brand ranges in response to this phenomenon. Supermarkets have also expanded the number of dark chocolate lines they stock, dwarfing their milk chocolate variants in some cases. Of course, it takes more beans to produce a bar of dark chocolate than are needed for a bar of milk—and that's at the root of the problem, Yesterday the cost of cacao beans for delivery in July on the London cocoa exchange shot to ￡1028 a tonne on exceptionally heavy trading. This was up ￡22 on the day and the highest price that the crop has fetched at any point since November 2004. The cost of buying cacao beans was pushed higher by canny investors who have placed record bets that prices will keep rising. Hedge funds, which make money by punting on whether commodity or share prices will rise or fall, have swallowed up a third of the cocoa contracts traded in New York, the other main cocoa trading centre. So far, industry buyers, such as Cadbury Schweppes, have refrained from joining the frenzy, although traders believe that a jump in prices will prompt them to build up their stocks. Prices have risen nearly thirty par cent since the beginning of December, largely on growing concern about what farmers in lvory Coast, the biggest cacao bean producer in west Africa, have dubbed the worst drought in living memory. To make matters worse, demand is outstripping supply as the teeth of consumers in developing markets begin to sweeten. The International Cocoa Organisation predicts a global cocoa shortfall of around 100000 tonnes this year alone, although private forecasts warn the deficit could be as much as 250000 tonnes. Getting the right beans is becoming crucial in a market that is fast following in the footsteps of wine and coffee in terms of getting consumers to appreciate its effect on the palate. People these days are willing to experiment more with food and drink. Rather like wine and coffee, people are realising there are varieties of chocolate available. Dark used to be a niche, but not any longer. With dark chocolate you ere tasting the cocoa, whereas with milk you are tasting the recipe. There are 450 different flavour elements in a single cacao bean, which itself varies in taste depe