Mr. Chris Magnus
Commissioner
U.S. Custom and Border Protection U.S. Department of Homeland Security 1300 Pennsylvania Avenue, N.W. Washington, D.C. 20229
February 14, 2022
Re: Request that you enforce the law to stop forced child labor in cocoa harvesting Dear Commissioner Magnus,
Congratulations on your appointment and best wishes in addressing the many challenges you face.
We, the undersigned, are writing to ask you to take long overdue action to address an urgent problem of ongoing forced child labor in cocoa harvesting in Côte d’Ivoire. Two years ago, on February 14, 2020, International Rights Advocates and Corporate Accountability Lab filed a petition under Section 307 of the Tariff Act of 1930 (“the Petition”) asking that U.S. Custom and Border Protection (CBP) take action, as provided for in its legislation, to ban the importation of cocoa by nine specific companies1 with clear records of harvesting cocoa with forced child labor in Côte d’Ivoire . The Petition referenced official, undisputed reports confirming massive numbers of child laborers in cocoa harvesting and supplemental evidence that many of these children are trafficked and forced to work on cocoa plantations. This past summer, on June 25, 2021, the Petitioners submitted a supplemental petition to CBP providing further evidence of trafficking and forced child labor in the Ivorian cocoa industry. This petition looked not just at specific instances of forced labor, but also documented new information about the manner in which child trafficking occurs, including through which border crossings, and identified specific actors involved in the trade. In our view, the inaction on the Petition is allowing horrific forced child labor to continue in cocoa harvesting and sharply conflicts with stated U.S. government policy.
We draw to your attention the following undisputable facts:
Clear evidence has been submitted to CBP documenting widespread, ongoing use of forced and trafficked child labor in harvesting and processing cocoa in Côte d’Ivoire.
The U.S. Department of Labor and U.S. State Department have both clearly documented the trafficking of children and forced child labor in the Côte d’Ivoire cocoa sector.
The Child Labor Cocoa Coordinating Group’s Annual Report provides ample evidence of forced child labor in the cocoa industry.
Reports from the Fair Labor Association, civil society groups, academics, as well as news reports, have documented evidence of forced child labor in the cocoa industry for years.
The Department of Labor has since 2008 published an annual list of products made with forced and child labor. Cocoa from Côte d’Ivoire has been on the list every year.
1 Nestlé, Cargill, Barry Callebaut, Mars, Olam, Hershey, Mondelēz, World’s Finest Chocolate, Inc., and Blommer Chocolate Co.
ILO Convention 182 regarding the Worst Forms of Child Labor, ratified by the U.S. in 1999, prohibits forced child labor.
The documented conditions of the children working in the cocoa industry in Côte d’Ivoire are well within the ILO’s indicators
of “forced labor.” Child workers are inherently vulnerable and carry out hazardous work,
including using machetes, carrying heavy loads, and spraying pesticides.
In 2020, the U.S. Department of Labor released a study it commissioned by the University
of Chicago’s NORC Institute finding that there are 1.56 million children harvesting cocoa in Côte d’Ivoire and Ghana, and 95% of these children, 1.48 million, are performing hazardous work that violates ILO Convention 182’s definition of the Worst Forms of Child Labor and should also meet the ILO's indicators of forced labor.
Thus, the U.S. government has officially established and condemns that forced child labor is involved in harvesting cocoa in Côte d’Ivoire .
For over 20 years the chocolate industry has exerted its power and influence to prevent the U.S. government from taking action to end the industry’s use of child labor. In 2001, to defeat a pending U.S. law to regulate the companies’ supply chains, the chocolate industry signed the Harkin-Engel Protocol, a “voluntary” initiative that gave the participating companies until 2005 to “phase out” their use of child labor. Two decades later, the chocolate industry has failed to take the necessary action to achieve their “voluntary” target and has given itself endless, self-serving, unilateral extensions of time. The industry now claims that by 2025 it will merely “reduce by 70%” their reliance on child labor.
The chocolate industry’s “voluntary” plan and public relations statements that it will end its use of child labor have zero credibility. The industry puts out contradictory messages, admitting on the one hand its use of child labor and pledging to end it. On the other hand, it argues in a pending federal case that it has no more responsibility for ending forced child labor in cocoa harvesting than a kid buying a candy bar at a store, the claims of eight former child slave laborers against the chocolate companies should be dismissed, and the chocolate companies granted impunity.2
Under CBP regulations, 19 C.F.R. § 12.42, if a Petition establishes that there is “reason to believe” cocoa from Côte d’Ivoire was produced by forced child labor, this allows CBP to “reasonably but not conclusively” find that cocoa from Côte d’Ivoire is produced by forced child labor and issue a Withhold and Release Order (WRO) stopping the importation of cocoa by the named companies from Côte d’Ivoire. This threshold has been clearly established by the Petition. The issuance of a WRO would require any of the named importing companies to establish “by satisfactory evidence that [its] merchandise was not ... manufactured in any part with” forced child labor.
The chocolate companies would then at long last be required to demonstrate whether they are profiting from forced child labor and to take real action to end it. Many of the responsible
2 See Defendants’ Joint Motion to Dismiss, ECF No. 27-1 at p. 11, Issouf Coubaly, et. al.v. Cargill Inc., et. al., Civil Action No. 21-0386 (D.DC 2021), available at https://www.internationalrightsadvocates.org/cases/tevracoubaly.
Young children are incapable of consenting to carry out
hazardous labor. Child labor that requires children to work at the expense of their health,
schooling, or well-being must be considered forced.
2
companies loudly proclaim there is no forced child labor in their cocoa supply chains. If they can’t, after 20 years of promising, prove this essential fact, they should not be extended the privilege of access to the U.S. market. The Petition suggested a flexible approach as to the timing of the requested WRO, and we are confident that giving the companies notice that a WRO is coming on a specific date will be the push needed to shift the cocoa industry from vague and empty promises to concrete action that it promised in signing the Harkin-Engel Protocol more than 20 years ago.
However, CBP has for the past two years taken no enforcement action based on the strong evidence presented in the Petition. It has taken no action to enforce the clear prohibition in the legislation on importing cocoa harvested by forced child labor. It has taken no action to implement the clear, strong policy of the U.S. government to prevent this continuing abuse of children. If CBP continues to decline to take action, this would send a message that the U.S. Government is turning a blind eye to the known use of forced child labor by powerful chocolate companies.
We recognize that the chocolate industry has enormous economic and political power and that the children being exploited and trafficked as child laborers do not. However, the law and policy of the United States is to protect children forced to work, and this should be especially true when they are being exploited by large multinationals that made a written promise over 20 years ago to stop this horrific practice. We are merely asking for the very relief that the chocolate industry itself promised to deliver over 20 years ago.
We call on you to put the lives of millions of children in West Africa ahead of the business interests of the chocolate industry. We call on you to enforce the law you are sworn to uphold to free these children from forced labor. We call on you to demonstrate that the U.S. Government’s policy that it will not tolerate forced child labor is genuine and serious.
We await your response with strong hope. Please direct your response to the Petitioners, Terrence Collingsworth (tc@iradvocates.org) and Charity Ryerson (charity@corpaccountabilitylab.org).
SIGNED:
CO-PETITIONERS
Terrence P. Collingsworth, Founder and Executive Director, International Rights Advocates
Charity Ryerson, Founder and Executive Director, Corporate Accountability Lab
Paul L. Hoffman, Co-Director, UC Irvine Civil Rights Litigation Clinic
ORGANIZATIONS
Cathy Feingold, International Director, AFL-CIO
Sharan Burrow, General Secretary, International Trade Union Confederation (ITUC) Willie Adams, President, International Longshore Warehouse Union
Ed Ferris, Secretary Treasurer, International Longshore Warehouse Union
Bobby Olvera Jr., Vice President – Mainland, International Longshore Warehouse Union
Reid Maki, Coordinator, Child Labor Coalition
Sally Greenberg, Executive Director, National Consumers League
Duncan Jepson, Managing Director, Liberty Shared
Dana Geffner, Executive Director, Fair World Project
Nina Smith, Executive Director, Goodweave
Ayn Riggs, Executive Director, Slavefreechocolate
Martina Vandenberg, Founder and President, Human Trafficking Legal Center
Patti Lynn, Executive Director, Corporate Accountability, USA
Georges C. Benjamin, MD, Executive Director, American Public Health Association, USA
Shahieda Adams, Director, Centre for Environmental and Occupational Health Research, Faculty of Health Sciences, University of Cape Town, South Africa
Devra Davis, President, Environmental Health Trust, USA and Fellow, Collegium Ramazzini Lauren Ornelas, President, Food Empowerment Project
Prof. John Packer, Director, Human Rights Research and Education Centre, University of Ottawa, ON, Canada.
Diana Bohn, Co-coordinator, Nicaragua Center for Community Action
Perry Gottesfeld, Executive Director, Occupational Knowledge International Peggy Mason, President, Rideau Institute on International Affairs, Ottawa, Canada. Grahame Russell, Director, Rights Action. USA & Canada.
Tientcheu Kameni Maurice, Terre et Développement, France.
Gopal Krishna, LL.M., PhD, Director, ToxicsWatch Alliance, New Delhi, India. Ayda Zugay, Principal and Co-Founder, Advancing Agency
Len Morris, Executive Director, Media Voices for Children
4Mr. Chris Magnus
Commissioner
U.S. Custom and Border Protection U.S. Department of Homeland Security 1300 Pennsylvania Avenue, N.W. Washington, D.C. 20229
February 14, 2022
Re: Request that you enforce the law to stop forced child labor in cocoa harvesting Dear Commissioner Magnus,
Congratulations on your appointment and best wishes in addressing the many challenges you face.
We, the undersigned, are writing to ask you to take long overdue action to address an urgent problem of ongoing forced child labor in cocoa harvesting in Côte d’Ivoire. Two years ago, on February 14, 2020, International Rights Advocates and Corporate Accountability Lab filed a petition under Section 307 of the Tariff Act of 1930 (“the Petition”) asking that U.S. Custom and Border Protection (CBP) take action, as provided for in its legislation, to ban the importation of cocoa by nine specific companies1 with clear records of harvesting cocoa with forced child labor in Côte d’Ivoire . The Petition referenced official, undisputed reports confirming massive numbers of child laborers in cocoa harvesting and supplemental evidence that many of these children are trafficked and forced to work on cocoa plantations. This past summer, on June 25, 2021, the Petitioners submitted a supplemental petition to CBP providing further evidence of trafficking and forced child labor in the Ivorian cocoa industry. This petition looked not just at specific instances of forced labor, but also documented new information about the manner in which child trafficking occurs, including through which border crossings, and identified specific actors involved in the trade. In our view, the inaction on the Petition is allowing horrific forced child labor to continue in cocoa harvesting and sharply conflicts with stated U.S. government policy.
We draw to your attention the following undisputable facts:
Clear evidence has been submitted to CBP documenting widespread, ongoing use of forced and trafficked child labor in harvesting and processing cocoa in Côte d’Ivoire.
The U.S. Department of Labor and U.S. State Department have both clearly documented the trafficking of children and forced child labor in the Côte d’Ivoire cocoa sector.
The Child Labor Cocoa Coordinating Group’s Annual Report provides ample evidence of forced child labor in the cocoa industry.
Reports from the Fair Labor Association, civil society groups, academics, as well as news reports, have documented evidence of forced child labor in the cocoa industry for years.
The Department of Labor has since 2008 published an annual list of products made with forced and child labor. Cocoa from Côte d’Ivoire has been on the list every year.
1 Nestlé, Cargill, Barry Callebaut, Mars, Olam, Hershey, Mondelēz, World’s Finest Chocolate, Inc., and Blommer Chocolate Co.
ILO Convention 182 regarding the Worst Forms of Child Labor, ratified by the U.S. in 1999, prohibits forced child labor.
The documented conditions of the children working in the cocoa industry in Côte d’Ivoire are well within the ILO’s indicators
of “forced labor.” Child workers are inherently vulnerable and carry out hazardous work,
including using machetes, carrying heavy loads, and spraying pesticides.
In 2020, the U.S. Department of Labor released a study it commissioned by the University
of Chicago’s NORC Institute finding that there are 1.56 million children harvesting cocoa in Côte d’Ivoire and Ghana, and 95% of these children, 1.48 million, are performing hazardous work that violates ILO Convention 182’s definition of the Worst Forms of Child Labor and should also meet the ILO's indicators of forced labor.
Thus, the U.S. government has officially established and condemns that forced child labor is involved in harvesting cocoa in Côte d’Ivoire .
For over 20 years the chocolate industry has exerted its power and influence to prevent the U.S. government from taking action to end the industry’s use of child labor. In 2001, to defeat a pending U.S. law to regulate the companies’ supply chains, the chocolate industry signed the Harkin-Engel Protocol, a “voluntary” initiative that gave the participating companies until 2005 to “phase out” their use of child labor. Two decades later, the chocolate industry has failed to take the necessary action to achieve their “voluntary” target and has given itself endless, self-serving, unilateral extensions of time. The industry now claims that by 2025 it will merely “reduce by 70%” their reliance on child labor.
The chocolate industry’s “voluntary” plan and public relations statements that it will end its use of child labor have zero credibility. The industry puts out contradictory messages, admitting on the one hand its use of child labor and pledging to end it. On the other hand, it argues in a pending federal case that it has no more responsibility for ending forced child labor in cocoa harvesting than a kid buying a candy bar at a store, the claims of eight former child slave laborers against the chocolate companies should be dismissed, and the chocolate companies granted impunity.2
Under CBP regulations, 19 C.F.R. § 12.42, if a Petition establishes that there is “reason to believe” cocoa from Côte d’Ivoire was produced by forced child labor, this allows CBP to “reasonably but not conclusively” find that cocoa from Côte d’Ivoire is produced by forced child labor and issue a Withhold and Release Order (WRO) stopping the importation of cocoa by the named companies from Côte d’Ivoire. This threshold has been clearly established by the Petition. The issuance of a WRO would require any of the named importing companies to establish “by satisfactory evidence that [its] merchandise was not ... manufactured in any part with” forced child labor.
The chocolate companies would then at long last be required to demonstrate whether they are profiting from forced child labor and to take real action to end it. Many of the responsible
2 See Defendants’ Joint Motion to Dismiss, ECF No. 27-1 at p. 11, Issouf Coubaly, et. al.v. Cargill Inc., et. al., Civil Action No. 21-0386 (D.DC 2021), available at https://www.internationalrightsadvocates.org/cases/tevracoubaly.
Young children are incapable of consenting to carry out
hazardous labor. Child labor that requires children to work at the expense of their health,
schooling, or well-being must be considered forced.
2
companies loudly proclaim there is no forced child labor in their cocoa supply chains. If they can’t, after 20 years of promising, prove this essential fact, they should not be extended the privilege of access to the U.S. market. The Petition suggested a flexible approach as to the timing of the requested WRO, and we are confident that giving the companies notice that a WRO is coming on a specific date will be the push needed to shift the cocoa industry from vague and empty promises to concrete action that it promised in signing the Harkin-Engel Protocol more than 20 years ago.
However, CBP has for the past two years taken no enforcement action based on the strong evidence presented in the Petition. It has taken no action to enforce the clear prohibition in the legislation on importing cocoa harvested by forced child labor. It has taken no action to implement the clear, strong policy of the U.S. government to prevent this continuing abuse of children. If CBP continues to decline to take action, this would send a message that the U.S. Government is turning a blind eye to the known use of forced child labor by powerful chocolate companies.
We recognize that the chocolate industry has enormous economic and political power and that the children being exploited and trafficked as child laborers do not. However, the law and policy of the United States is to protect children forced to work, and this should be especially true when they are being exploited by large multinationals that made a written promise over 20 years ago to stop this horrific practice. We are merely asking for the very relief that the chocolate industry itself promised to deliver over 20 years ago.
We call on you to put the lives of millions of children in West Africa ahead of the business interests of the chocolate industry. We call on you to enforce the law you are sworn to uphold to free these children from forced labor. We call on you to demonstrate that the U.S. Government’s policy that it will not tolerate forced child labor is genuine and serious.
We await your response with strong hope. Please direct your response to the Petitioners, Terrence Collingsworth (tc@iradvocates.org) and Charity Ryerson (charity@corpaccountabilitylab.org).
SIGNED:
CO-PETITIONERS
Terrence P. Collingsworth, Founder and Executive Director, International Rights Advocates Charity Ryerson, Founder and Executive Director, Corporate Accountability Lab
Paul L. Hoffman, Co-Director, UC Irvine Civil Rights Litigation Clinic
ORGANIZATIONS
Cathy Feingold, International Director, AFL-CIO
Sharan Burrow, General Secretary, International Trade Union Confederation (ITUC) Willie Adams, President, International Longshore Warehouse Union
3
Ed Ferris, Secretary Treasurer, International Longshore Warehouse Union
Bobby Olvera Jr., Vice President – Mainland, International Longshore Warehouse Union
Reid Maki, Coordinator, Child Labor Coalition
Sally Greenberg, Executive Director, National Consumers League
Duncan Jepson, Managing Director, Liberty Shared
Dana Geffner, Executive Director, Fair World Project
Nina Smith, Executive Director, Goodweave
Ayn Riggs, Executive Director, Slavefreechocolate
Martina Vandenberg, Founder and President, Human Trafficking Legal Center
Patti Lynn, Executive Director, Corporate Accountability, USA
Georges C. Benjamin, MD, Executive Director, American Public Health Association, USA
Shahieda Adams, Director, Centre for Environmental and Occupational Health Research, Faculty of Health Sciences, University of Cape Town, South Africa
Devra Davis, President, Environmental Health Trust, USA and Fellow, Collegium Ramazzini Lauren Ornelas, President, Food Empowerment Project
Prof. John Packer, Director, Human Rights Research and Education Centre, University of Ottawa, ON, Canada.
Diana Bohn, Co-coordinator, Nicaragua Center for Community Action
Perry Gottesfeld, Executive Director, Occupational Knowledge International Peggy Mason, President, Rideau Institute on International Affairs, Ottawa, Canada. Grahame Russell, Director, Rights Action. USA & Canada.
Tientcheu Kameni Maurice, Terre et Développement, France.
Gopal Krishna, LL.M., PhD, Director, ToxicsWatch Alliance, New Delhi, India. Ayda Zugay, Principal and Co-Founder, Advancing Agency
Len Morris, Executive Director, Media Voices for Children
