Bibliometric analysis of scientific research on cocoa (Theobroma cacao L.) in Mexico

Objective: to analyze the scientific contributions made in Mexico on Cocoa tree cultivation during the period 1999-2022 and to quantify those contributions by gender. Design/Methodology/Approach: scientific articles were collected from major publishers (Elsevier, MDPI, Wiley and Springer), database of articles from Open Access Journals (CONRICYT, Scielo, Redalyc, Latindex, Claryvate Analytics, Periodica and DOAJ), and the open access web search engine Google Scholar. The Gephi software was used to build networks of the institutions, the researchers’ affiliation and co-authorship networks. Results: scientific production showed an exponential growth of scientific texts at the national scale where Cocoa tree was the subject of research. In the last 22 years, scientific productivity was concentrated in three main topics: biotechnology (18.51%), economy (15.26%), and diseases, (13.31%). The research was focused on the Mexican southeast, and was led by Colegio de Postgraduados (COLPOS), the National Institute of Forestry, Agricultural and Livestock Research (INIFAP), and the Juarez Autonomous University of Tabasco. The male gender presented a higher percentage of articles published as first author and as author for correspondence. Limitations/Implications of the study: the documents analyzed were exclusively scientific articles. Findings/Conclusions: There is a research gap in species propagation techniques, ethnobotany, irrigation, plant physiology, and the influence of indigenous cultures and groups on the transfer of knowledge.