History of Burie 

Hans Burie comes from a large family. With 5 brothers and two sisters he grew up in Diksmuide (Belgium), a little town in Flanders Fields near the North Sea.
At the age of 20 Hans began to make chocolates at home. His first chocolates were 'Sea Shells'. He had no shop but used the living room to establish his delicacies. His brothers and sisters encouraged and helped him. Slowly but surely he gained some regular clients. Some bakers in the neighborhood asked to produce chocolates for them. With a small car he supplied their shops with his products working from dawn till sunset.
At the beginning of the 60's he left is family and started to work in Antwerp through different distributors but his ambition was to have his own shop. In 1964 he took over a shop well known for its chocolates and biscuits in the center of Antwerp. Hans Burie specialized in the production of chocolates to the traditional methods.
In 1969 the shop was totally renewed and he engaged his first 2 men. The name Hans Burie became quite well known in Antwerp not in the least for the big chocolate creations he showed in his shop window. 
By making real pieces of art in chocolate and marzipan such as the town hall of Antwerp he attracted people to his shop. Later on he based his creations upon the actuality -one of them was based on the meeting of President Reagan and President Gorbachov. 
During the last years he built a new workshop and engaged more people. Also his son Lieven ended school and came to help his father to make sure that this wonderful craftsmanship will be continued. 
Today the shop window of Hans Burie is still his medium to make publicity for his delicious chocolates. Every month people come to see his new display of new handmade masterworks. Because of his original and topical subjects he gets coverage in newspapers, magazines and television programs.
With his business still growing Hans Burie is now expanding Online. And because Hans wishes to accomplish many more ideas he will take up any challenge.

SAVING THE RAINFOREST, 

One Morsel at a Time

The next time you bite into a bar of chocolate, consider that taste as a link to some of the world's most endangered forests-and to the millions of farmers who live near them. Chocolate comes from the seeds of the cacao, a small rainforest tree native to the Americas. Produced around the world, it is grown mainly on lands that have lost their original forest cover, sometimes to the cocoa itself. Today, all of the world's major cocoa areas are "biodiversity hotspots"-regions that are unusually rich in biodiversity, but which are also highly threatened. 
The world's retail chocolate business is worth an estimated $42-60 billion annually. Yet only about 6-8 percent of this revenue actually makes its way back to the cocoa farmers, many of whom are poorer smallholders. Labor abuse is said to be rife in some cocoa regions, and reports of farmers enslaving thousands of child workers in places like Cote d'Ivoire have sparked widespread criticism of the industry. 
Fortunately, a number of manufacturers now offer chocolate bars and other products that are more environmentally friendly and socially responsible. These products contain cocoa that comes from farms that conserve forest, that don't use child labor, or are organic. 


Did you know?

Cocoa is grown commercially in nearly 60 countries, but production is concentrated in just a few. In 2002, Cote d'Ivoire, Ghana, Indonesia, Nigeria, and Brazil accounted for 79 percent of global production.

The global area in cocoa production has expanded by nearly a quarter since 1990 and now totals more than 70,000 square kilometers, an area larger than Ireland.

Cocoa accounts for more than 13 percent of the original forestlands of Cote d'Ivoire, and is still chewing up forest in parts of West Africa and Indonesia.

Although cocoa is sometimes grown alongside other plants, in many cases it is grown as a monoculture in full sun, an arrangement that supports far less species diversity.

One of the most common pesticides used on cocoa in West Africa is lindane, a toxic organochlorine cousin of DDT.