Brazil court fines Cargill in case involving child labor on Cocoa Farms by By Marcelo Teixeira and Ana Mano

SAO PAULO, Sept 26 (Reuters) - Commodities trader Cargill has been ordered by a Brazilian court to pay 600,000 reais ($120,185) as indemnity for buying cocoa from farms where child labor or forced work has been identified.

U.S.-based Cargill said on Tuesday it disagreed with the complaints and fine and would appeal the ruling to a higher court.

According to a decision dated Sept. 18, seen by Reuters, from the 39th Labor Court in the northeastern state of Bahia, Cargill was also ordered to add to its contracts with Brazilian cocoa suppliers clauses to end the commercial relationship if child labor or other unlawful working conditions occur.

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The true cost of chocolate- Article from the GlobeandMail. May 12th 2023

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.

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An agreed food metric labeling system is paramount

For twenty years businesses, governments, NGOs, and activists have been working towards bettering our world in the realm of climate change, labor rights, food security, soil health, etc. But despite the thousands of business-driven initiatives, thousands of NGO projects, new laws, and citizens doing their best, no area has shown any improvement. A glaring void hampering progress is that none of the data used by food companies is verified. What is real? What is Brandwashing? Who the heck knows? Take chocolate as an example, there are many ethical chocolate companies that are running their businesses ethically the whole way through. But there isn’t a chocolate company out there that doesn’t claim to be ethical and sustainable. So then, who is complicit for the 1.6 million exploited children in the industry? Who benefitted from destroying the vital rainforest? At the end of the day does Brandwashing win over progress? Not if I can help it! It is paramount that the food industry adopts a labeling system that is based on independent primary data collected by unvested scientists. In other words, we all should be operating on an agreed food metric that is based on the truth. By “we” I mean, investors, financial institutions, and consumers. Fortunately, there is one. OmniAction has created the OmniLabel. I, Ayn Riggs, director of Slave Free Chocolate, have opened the US office of OmniAction. For more information, please either contact Slave Free Chocolate and/or visit OmniAction.

Please Customs and Border Protection, DO YOUR JOB!!!

The US Customs and Border Protection Agency is sitting on something that could really help.

The Department of Labor has cocoa listed as a child labor and forced child labor commodity. The industrial chocolate industry knows this as they clearly admit it is part of their supply chain and promised to clean this up in 2001 when it signed the Harkin Engel Protocol. Unfortunately, it hasn’t. Despite a slew of paltry initiatives, no positive change as been recorded. What has been documented by the Department of Labor is that the number of exploited children in the cocoa sector of Ghana and The Ivory Coast has risen.

But get this, the US Customs and Border Patrol Agency is supposed to issue an embargo and halt the import of these beans. It’s law. But despite and endless amount of outreach including a detailed petition, they haven’t done their job.

Below are the screen shots to a response that International Rights Advocates receive over 2 years after they filed a detailed petition.

After working on this issue for 16 years now, I really believe that halting these beans would help inspire the complicit industrial chocolate companies to fulfill the promises they not only gave to these children but the rest of the world.

Ayn Riggs

Director Slave Free Chocolate

The Hill Times letter to the Editor August 8th 2022 by Fernando Morales-de la Cruz

There are various initiatives being proposed going on at the government lever in the US, Canada and the EU. None of them are written prioritizing the children they are claiming to help. All are prioritizing the corporate lobbies. Here is one regarding a Canadian proposal.

Documentary maker Miki Mistrati wants consumers to know the truth about chocolate

New film: "There is no role in cocoa production that is safe for the 1.56 million children working in West Africa"

by Lise Colyer March 29, 2022 in Society, Business, Features, Governance

Miki Mistrati has been documenting child labour in West Africa’s cocoa industry since 2007 – and he’s in therapy.

“You never get used to this,” he says. “I want people to understand what they are a part of. If you want to buy a cheap chocolate bar supporting child labour that’s your decision, but don’t tell me that you didn’t know.”

Research accepted by the cocoa industry says that 1.56 million children are working in cocoa production in Ivory Coast and Ghana. According to Miki Mistrati’s latest documentary film The Chocolate War, a high proportion of them have been trafficked from neighbouring countries such as Burkina Faso and Mali.

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US Senators Propose ban on Ivorian Cocoa. Another Washington Post article.

The Washington Post's article in June stirred 2 Senators into action. This is a good thing but, I agree with the stand that The Ivory Coast is taking, that a ban would hurt the children first. We at SFC agree. We also hold the stand that the chocolate companies who signed the Harkin Engle Protocol are not keeping up with their promises. Much much more can and should be done on their end, in conjunction with whatever the IC and Ghana governments are doing. It is our charter that not only are the worst forms of child labor including trafficking in the cocoa industry is eradicated but that the 2.3 million children at risk whether they are exploited family labor or trafficked children are safely brought out of this abject situation.

US Weighs Plan to Block Cocoa
By Peter Whoriskey

August 7, 2019 at 10:44 AM EDT

A proposed U.S. ban on cocoa from Ivory Coast, the world’s leading supplier of chocolate’s essential ingredient, is facing strong political resistance from the West African nation.