The true cost of chocolate by GEOFFREY YORK AND ADRIAN MORROW
Labels for ‘sustainable’ cocoa can hide harsh realities for farmers trying to earn a living and eliminate child labour. In Africa and Latin America, The Globe spoke with growers on the front lines of global price wars.Canadian consumers, seeing labels that boast of “100-per-cent sustainably sourced cocoa” on many of the most popular chocolate products in Canada’s supermarkets, might never imagine that hunger and poverty are the grim daily reality for millions of cocoa farmers in Africa and Latin America.
Sustainable cocoa – a promise of all the major cocoa and chocolate companies – is vaguely defined and can include anything from training and education programs to a variety of supply certification schemes that pay premiums and attempt to trace cocoa origins. But at the heart of the sustainability concept is a pledge by the major manufacturers to help farmers gain a decent income. The promise is crucial to their marketing: a reassuring signal to consumers that a chocolate purchase is an ethical one.