Makira Gold was founded in Dec 2014 by Brian Atkin and his first cousin Ronnie Maxwell initially with the purpose of providing economic opportunities for their impoverished rural community of Tawatana on the island of Makira in the Solomon Islands.
Over the years the business model has changed a number of times to the current sustainable model of sourcing premium cacao beans from Solomon Islands and supplying into Australia.
Brian was born in Solomon Islands and his father George Atkin is from Tawatana, Makira, Solomon Islands, from the Aoba and Amaeo tribes. Brian lives in Brisbane, Australia. He has a fulltime job in the Energy sector but Makira Gold is his passion project. Brian does not take an income from the Makira Gold business.
In 2017, Ronnie moved on from the business to find other means to support his young family and another close relative Henry Kukamwane Hiyo joined the team.
Since the beginning Makira Gold has learnt from many setbacks but have also achieved much. Their vision expanded from just supporting their local community to also trying to strengthen the Solomon Islands specialty cacao industry, which shows much promise and potential but has some significant barriers – in particular the high cost and poor reliability of in-country transportation, logistics, dependence on weather, local corruption and the inconsistent quality of cacao products. Additionally a lack of trust between Solomon Islands producers and overseas buyers continues to plague export markets. There are numerous examples for all market participants of why this mistrust exists.
Between 2016-19, Makira Gold had a presence in the Solomon Islands as one of the leading exporters of premium cacao beans into European, Australian and New Zealand markets. COVID forced a change to the business model to the current model.
Makira Gold now sources the best quality cacao beans from Solomon Island farmers and exports into Australia where it is sold to craft chocolate makers.
Beans supplied by Makira Gold have won gold, silver and bronze awards at international and Australian chocolate competitions including Academy of Chocolate and Australian Food Awards.
Makira Gold 