Saturday morning and it's another frosty start. The last two nights have been really frosty and this means that I can't mow my lawn. The lawn really needs a trim but I'm told that if you chop grass when it's frosty you could kill the stuff. Patience, patience, then! Do you know which country consumes more boxed chocolates than any other on earth? Go on have a guess. Alright I'll tell you: it's Russia. If you've ever been there and seen the locals dishing out boxes of chocs to each other you won't be surprised. 303 million kilogrammes of the stuff in 2001 with a value of around £870 million. Guess who PAYS the most for their boxed chocolates ... of course, WE do. The UK has the highest priced boxed chocolates, you will not be in the slightest surprised to hear: per capita expenditure on boxed chocolates reached £13.8 in 2001. That means we spent around £ 799,750,000 on boxed chocs in 2001. The UK really is a nation of chocoholics, with the largest chocolate consumption rate in Europe and a 30% share of the total European market in 2001. Even in the novelty sector, the smallest in the UK chocolate confectionery market, expenditure and consumption rates are higher than anywhere else in the world. Now, which country came second, do you think? The USA? China? The UK, even? You're in for a surprise as it's not even the supposedly amorous latin lovers: the French, the Italians or the Spaniards ... close though. It's Brazil with 168 million kg of the stuff. Brazil's the world's fifth largest producer of cocoa, too, by the way. Isn't it funny that boxes of chocs are being reported in kilogrammes? In case you're duff at arithmetic, 303 million kg = 303,000 tonnes. I got this chocolate info from Data Monitor. DW