Chocolate bar with all UK ingredients made for first time in almost 100 years

You might have seen stories at Newsround about the price of chocolate going up, with the big reason being that cocoa is getting harder to get hold of.

The UK's chocolate market relies entirely on imported cocoa.

Cocoa is the main ingredient in chocolate and comes from the beans of the cacao tree. Countries with warmer climates are the leading producers of cocoa.

But Maha Khan, a food security master's student in Reading, has made the first chocolate bar made from 100% British ingredients in 94 years.

Her bar uses cocoa not from Brazil or Bali, but Reading in Berkshire - and she did it to highlight the problems the cocoa growing industry is facing.

The bar itself has been named Reading 100 Chocolate Bar and was created at the University of Reading, to mark its 100th anniversary.

It is the first of its kind since 1932, when UK sweets company Rowntree's gifted a six-year-old Princess Elizabeth (later to become Queen Elizabeth II).

This was the only other bar of commercially viable UK-grown chocolate ever made - that means a bar that doesn't cost more than it is worth to create.

The cocoa for the bar was grown at the university's cocoa quarantine centre.

There are more than 300 types of cocoa plant there, these are carefully managed to prevent the spread of pests and diseases between regions that grow cocoa and also gives scientists a chance to study the plants.

Maha said it was important to highlight the research being done at centre "which not many people are aware of".

"It is the primary hub of transfer for 97% of cocoa growing countries," she said.

"So the cocoa is quarantined there for two years, and so from those plants that are growing I decided to make this chocolate bar."

Maha harvested the cocoa she used for the chocolate bar from the quarantine centre, removing the pulp, the beans and then fermented it.

She said the process took between seven to 10 days, then she laid it all out in the sun: "We've had glorious weather, that helped dry it."

Maha told the BBC she made the bar to highlight the challenges facing the cocoa growing industry.

She said: "It is incredible that we can make 100% British chocolate – but in the context of climate change, pests and diseases, there are estimates that 30 to 40% is lost.

"And we've seen with these heatwaves, climate change, these problems and challenges are only going to get exacerbated."