Nestled among lush rainforest in Cairns' sleepy northwest, a researcher slashes and snips at rows of densely packed trees in an effort to revolutionise the way cocoa is produced around the world.
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Bunches of bananas, mounds of hacked cassava, and hardened eucalypt branches plummet to the earth, crowding the skinny cacao tree trunks spaced out in each row.
With a huge variety of other species, the plot at the James Cook University looks chaotic - but it has been meticulously planned in the hopes it could shore up sustainable cocoa supplies and bolster farmers' livelihoods.
The plot, funded by global confectionary giant Mars Wrigley, has been designed according to the "syntropic" farming method, with Cairns' heat and wrap-around humidity mirroring overseas growers' conditions.
Developed by Swiss-Brazilian scientist Ernst Gotsch, the method is a type of agroforestry, a land management system in which trees or shrubs are grown around crops.
It promises consumers sustainable produce free of chemicals, and farmers rejuvenated land with a bounty of highly resilient plots.
The method involves growers working with nature to harness and control its energy, and speed up natural succession.
Program manager Samantha Forbes explains if a syntropic system was attempted in the desert, a sensible start would be succulent plants that don't require much energy.
"The succulents will grow. They'll die. That biomass goes back into the soil and starts changing it, giving it more energy for the next successional line of plants to come along.
"Succession happens over thousands and thousands of years and, basically, landscapes transform from deserts, potentially into rainforests."
Syntropics speeds up succession and mimics the growth of natural rainforests. Farmers plant different species together, and each plant has a specific role to play.
That could be shading a young plant from the harsh sun, or building biology in the soil.
Fruits and vegetables can be harvested and sold or, like in the case of the cocoa project - a world-first looking at the trees and syntropics - plants can be stripped out of the ecosystem when they're no longer needed.
About 18 months into the project, Ms Forbes is yet to look at data on how the plot is developing after its latest pruning, which happens twice a year to create the forest-like floor and clear space for the next species.
However, there's positive signs in cocoa tree growth as well as the soil, which was initially so compact it was essentially clay.
"Aggregates are forming, which means the soil structure is changing into a more beneficial soil for plants to grow in," Ms Forbes said.
"There's a lot of funghi, there's a lot of insect life, the soil is changing colour. You can dig in it very easily, whereas if you're in the (control cocoa) monoculture, it's still very compact and very hard to dig in."
Species like eucalypts have helped, given they have a prolific root system that alters the soil and the microclimate, and invites beneficial microorganisms to take hold.
Ms Forbes is also yet to have to use any pesticides on the cocoa. "For me, it's unheard of," she said.
A big reason behind the cocoa project, implemented with company Syntropic Solutions, is to see whether the method would realistically pay off for smallholder cocoa growers overseas in places like Indonesia.
The theory is farmers could take their extra yield - like bananas - to market when they're not harvesting cocoa.
Ms Forbes admits the syntropic plot doesn't appear less labour intensive than the cocoa monoculture.
The chance to potentially regenerate land, though, and get a diversified income could be worth farmers' investment, she said.
"We can't have this future goal of just the least labour for the highest production, because that's what's led us to the production systems we have today, which are failing," Ms Forbes said.
"They might have an increased yield for the first 10 years and then the soils are dying, the trees are stressed and they're dying, and the yield declines.
"Then you're left with either a landscape you have to spend money on to regenerate it or you abandon that landscape."
With consumers shifting to a focus on more ethical production, James Cook University plant eco-physiologist and soil scientist Alex Cheesman sees the benefit in concepts like syntropics.
"It's beholden on us as consumers to demand that we are sourcing things ethically," he said.
That was especially true in chocolate production, which has historically been associated with things like child labour, he said.
In Australia, cocoa remains a fledging market outside of niche growers because of the country's high labour costs, and researchers don't expect that to change anytime soon.
Ms Forbes hopes in the near future, most if not all smallholder cocoa farmers in Indonesia and elsewhere overseas will switch to agroforestry models, and the Cairns project should contribute to that.
"If we want to have farms which are regenerative, sustainable, and doing the right thing, we have to change the way we're farming a little bit," she said.
Mars intends to roll out the research findings across more than 350,000 cocoa farmers in its global supply chain.
Although it doesn't directly own cocoa farms, the company works with those on the ground.
"What it all comes back to is the context around the reality of cocoa farmers and our desire to improve their livelihoods and their quality of life," Mars Wrigley Australia's Chris Hutton said.
None of the cocoa from the Cairns plot will go into Mars' supply chain - it's purely for research purposes.
Mars has committed to ensuring 100 per cent of its cocoa is responsibly sourced and traceable by 2025, and the Cairns project is part of an initiative to build sustainable supply.
The author travelled to Cairns as a guest of Mars Wrigley.
Australian Associated Press
