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I also wonder what the reaction would be if Jamie Oliver did a show on chocolate and child-slavery. I wonder what the reaction would be if on his show, his goal was to make a chocolate pudding and in order to get that chocolate pudding on to our tables we see children - some as young as eight years old - being beaten and tortured to harvest the beans that can get turned into chocolate. I wonder if people would be shocked to actually see it rather than burying their heads in the sand in their determination to eat a "yummy dessert".
In 2005 there was an estimated figure of 12,000 children who had been trafficked into Ivory Coast to work as slaves on the cocoa plantations. The children who pick the cocoa beans earn nothing, sold by the trafficker and made to suffer.
In 2006 the chocolate industry had a reported turnover of $39,585,800,000 from just the top 10 companies.
They promised in 2001 to eradicate the worst forms of exploitative labour from their industry by 2005. They failed. They promised to do it by July 1st 2008 by putting in place certification of each farm that it was slave free.
Tragically they have redefined certification so it now merely means surveying the situation. On top of that they target only 50% of the cocoa producing regions in Ivory Coast and Ghana instead of the required 100%.
Industry has already begun to say they have met their obligations.
Industry can already tell us if our chocolate is additive free, sugar free, fat free or colour free. But they will not tell us it is slave free because they can’t.
It isn’t.
The International Cocoa Initiative is failing. Every day the agreements made under the Harkin Engel Protocol are being eroded. *We* get our chocolate. *They* get their profits. And more children die....
Further reading: The Sanctity of the Individual
6 comments:
Gosh I so agree E. Though I wonder (and I hate to say it) if just seeing vision of it on a screen would have the same impact as the act of killing chicks live on stage? It seems to me that many people are horrified by how animals are treated but are somehow immune to the horrors being visited on other human beings, even if it right under their noses (for example homelessness, drug use, child abuse, prostitution...) :-(
Good point on the chockie.
It's horrible to think that something we associate with good times, love and yumminess is supporting slavery and suffering.
Even Fair Trade has nasty carbon miles attached for most people who are chocoholics and live in temperate climates.
In my city there is a whopping big chocolate factory about 2 kms away that supplies most of the southern hemisphere with Cadbury's chocolate.
We went on their chocolate tour, and they have an interesting display where it shows where the ingredients to make the choc come from.
The only local ingredient (apart from the energy in the factory) for most of the choc products is the milk. And dairy has a high carbon footprint and water impact, even when local :-( (You can't win!)
The cocoa comes from about 10 different countries, as does coconut, cocoa butter, oil, sugar etc. All imported from all over.
I think we've forgotten that chocolate used to be considered a very luxurious product, saved only for priests and royalty.
Maybe we need to return chocolate to its place as a 'rare occasions' food, instead of a daily consumption food (well, it is for me!). Even if we buy Fair Trade, we're still trashing the planet.
Just my $10 (too much to be classified as 10c) :-)
Thanks all.
J - you know I do wonder whether or not we (as a society) have become so disconnected that we no longer see what's in front of us and whether we take human atrocities in our stride.
Daharja - yes, chocolate and coffee are actually one of the world's most travelled food. The chocolate supply chain is especially convoluted. TBH, I can't wait till Cocoa Farm starts using their cocoa fields (in northern NSW) to make chocolate for us!
Having said that, yes, there are luxury foods and we do need to start acknowledging them rather than demanding that they be "easy" for us to consume. It was our demands that have perpetuated child-slavery in the cocoa industry.
Maybe you should write to him, and ask him to do this. He would be the perfect person to raise awareness of the issue globally.
Australia DOES produce some of its own chocolate now. A friend of mine (who is a real chockie connoiseur) bought us some. It's a small operation in southern Qld, from memory, and everything is Aussie-made and sourced and owned. It *was* expensive though - I think she paid about $6 for a 100g bar. But yum.
I wish I could remember the name of the brand. You might try googling it. But it is certainly available on the market now, although she probably bought it from a speciality store.
I know that there will still be the food miles issue, but Cadbury UK and Ireland are making Dairy Milk fairtrade this summer, and on their website (http://cadburydairymilk.typepad.com/fairtrade/2009/03/what-about-the-rest-of-cadbury-why-isnt-it-all-fairtrade.html)it says that they plan to make this an international measure in due course (didn't specify dates), so that's an improvement for the welfare of some children at least.
I'll certainly be making sure that any easter chocolate I buy is fairly traded.
http://www.antislavery.org/archive/press/040309cadbury_fairtrade_certified.htm
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