2024-04-02 15:17:04
Dedicated to chocolate, one of the world’s most popular desserts, World Chocolate Day is celebrated on July 7, the anniversary of the first arrival of this special food to Europe in 1550. Quite a lot of chocolate is consumed all over the world, seven million tons per year.
This means that one kilogram of chocolate is consumed per person per year on earth.
As documented in 2010 documentaries such as The Dark Side of Chocolate, this craving has some unpleasant side effects. The chocolate industry has long been under pressure to address ethical and sustainability issues such as deforestation and the use of child labor to harvest its raw material, cocoa beans.
So, how successful is the industry in solving the problems that cloud this popular taste?
Sustainability: Where does chocolate come from?
One of the main problems of the chocolate industry is the very limited supply of cocoa beans, the raw material of chocolate.
Cocoa trees are very delicate and require a lot of rain and heat to grow.
On the other hand, trees need forest cover to protect them from light and wind. There are a limited number of countries that meet these conditions.
According to the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO), just two West African countries – Ivory Coast and Ghana – produce almost 52 percent of the world’s harvested cocoa beans.
With the production from other countries of the region such as Nigeria and Cameroon, Africa’s share rises to 69 percent.
Climate crisis and deforestation
Expectations of rising temperatures and droughts due to the climate crisis in West Africa are causing serious concern to farmers. Another problem is deforestation. Producers are clearing natural forest areas to create cocoa tree plantations.
Environmentalists say cocoa farming is one of the main reasons for the rapid deforestation in Ivory Coast.
According to the World Bank, the country has lost 80 percent of its forest cover in the last 50 years. This is one of the highest rates of deforestation in the world.
The forests here are still under threat. US-based Mighty Earth, which maps deforestation worldwide using satellite data, notes that this African country lost 470 square kilometers of forest in 2020 alone.
Deforestation is directly related to the climate crisis, which threatens the livelihood of these farmers in the long run. Dr. Michael Odijie, a researcher specializing in Africa’s cocoa industry at LKU, believes that today’s economy has led to the collapse.
“Cocoa farming has a huge environmental cost. Unfortunately, this is likely to continue because the cost of cocoa production in virgin forest is lower than in grasslands, and [kakao] the prices are too low for sustainable production,” Odijie told the BBC.
But the chocolate industry claims it is beginning to take responsibility for these issues. US-based Mars, the world’s biggest chocolate maker, has told the BBC it aims to make its supply chain more sustainable by making the cocoa it uses “deforestation-free” by 2025.
“Illegal cocoa has no place in Mars’ supply chain,” the statement said in response to our questions. Mars also announced its involvement in the Cocoa and Forestry Initiative, which was established in partnership with the governments of Ivory Coast and Ghana.
Company in these countries
He also announced that he aims to stop deforestation and restore forest areas.
Child abuse
There is evidence of harsh working conditions for children (and adults) in cocoa production.
In 1998, the UN Children’s Fund revealed that children from neighboring countries were being systematically smuggled into Ivory Coast to work on cocoa farms.
According to the UK-based NGO Anti-Slavery International, these practices still continue.
“It is estimated that at least 30,000 adults and children worldwide are involved in forced labor in the cocoa industry,” spokeswoman Jessica Turner told the BBC.
But the wider use of child labor means something else. According to the International Labor Organization (ILO), this term refers to work that “deprives children of their childhood” – working in harmful or dangerous conditions that prevent them from attending school.
A 2020 study by the University of Chicago found that two out of five children living in the cocoa-growing areas of Ivory Coast and Ghana work in hazardous jobs such as using sharp tools, working night shifts, and exposure to the sun and agricultural chemicals.
Since 2001, the chocolate industry has committed to ending child labor in cocoa production as part of an international agreement called the Harkin-Engel Protocol. But by 2020, Ivory Coast and Ghana were required to reduce child labor by 70 percent.
The World Cocoa Foundation (WCF), the umbrella organization for some of the world’s biggest players in the chocolate industry, has acknowledged the problem of child labor in the industry, estimating that 1.6 million children are exploited in cocoa farming in Ivory Coast and Ghana alone.
DKF states on its website that it has “zero tolerance for forced labor, modern slavery or human trafficking practices in its supply chain.”
Are we paying a fair price for the chocolate we eat?
According to some producers who advocate fair trade and even the chocolate industry, we are not paying the right price for chocolate.
Inkota, a German-based non-governmental organization that calls for fair payment for chocolate and runs an ongoing awareness campaign, says the low prices paid to cocoa producers exacerbate the problems facing the chocolate industry.
“Cocoa farmers are in deep poverty, and this is directly linked to issues like child labor and deforestation,” Inkota Human Rights Adviser Evelyn Bahn told the BBC.
Fair trade experts estimate that in 2020, the average cocoa farmer earned just $0.90 a day, below the World Bank’s extreme poverty line ($1.90).
“Poverty and all the exploitative practices associated with it are largely due to the low price paid to cocoa farmers,” says Michael Odijie.
Organizations such as Inkota and the Fair Trade Foundation believe it is important to raise market prices for cocoa beans to combat this problem.
Some chocolate companies have committed to paying farmers more.
One of them is Tony’s Chocolonely, which was founded as an activism platform against the exploitation of workers in the chocolate industry and is now the best-selling chocolate brand in the Netherlands.
“The only reason we exist is to free chocolate from child and slave labor. And [kakao üçün] is to pay a fair price,” the company’s UK chief executive, Ben Greensmith, told the BBC.
And this does not mean that customers will pay more for sweets.
Inkota estimates that if cocoa farmers were paid a living wage for their production, the price of 100 grams of chocolate would increase by less than $0.20.
“It’s not really a huge increase, but it will make a big difference in the lives of cocoa farmers,” says Bahn.
Bbc