Child labour in cocoa production
A major study of the issue, published in Fortune magazine in the U.S. in March 2016, concluded that approximately 2.1 million children in West Africa "still do the dangerous and physically taxing work of harvesting cocoa".
"[9][10][11][12][13][14] A small observational study, published in 2005 and financed by USAID, examines the many health hazards of cocoa production in western Ghana.
A report funded by the U.S. Department of Labor concluded that "Industry and the Governments of Côte d'Ivoire and Ghana have taken steps to investigate the problem and are implementing projects that address issues identified in the Protocol.
A study of the issue, published in Fortune magazine in the U.S. in March 2016, concluded that approximately 2.1 million children in West Africa "still do the dangerous and physically taxing work of harvesting cocoa".
[20] A separate sub-study conducted by NORC and commissioned by the World Cocoa Foundation in 2019, provides detailed results which demonstrate that hazardous child labour has been reduced by one-third in communities where company programs are in place.
[23][24] Despite these efforts, goals to reduce child labour in West Africa by 70% before 2020 are slowed by persistent poverty, absence of schools, expansion of cocoa farmland, and increased demand for coco.
A report later that year by New Food Economy stated that the Child Labour Monitoring and Remediation Systems implemented by the International Cocoa Initiative and its partners has been useful, but "they are currently reaching less than 20 percent of the over two million children impacted".
[30] In a press statement accompanying the release of the NORC report Kareem Kysia, Director of Vulnerable Populations Research at NORC and a lead author of the report, stated,As the overall production of cocoa increased dramatically, cocoa farming spread into areas of Côte d’Ivoire and Ghana where infrastructure to monitor child labour was weak and awareness of laws regulating it was low.
[34] Children in cocoa growing areas face the realities of rural poverty (scarcity of land, food insecurity, lack of education infrastructure, access to potable water, poor health services, etc.).
[42] In 2002, Côte d'Ivoire had 12,000 children with no relatives nearby, which suggested they were trafficked,[41] likely from neighboring Mali, Burkina Faso and Togo.
[43] According to a 2009 snowball sampling study, the majority of those with childhood cocoa labour experience were trafficked (75% from Burkina Faso and 63% from Mali).
By 2020, West African nations Ghana and Côte d'Ivoire were upgraded to Tier 2 in the 2020 US State Department's TIP Report in part for their respective progress to curb child labour abuses in the cocoa sector.
[48] In 2001, due to pressure applied by the US Congress and potential US and United Kingdom boycotts,[41] the chocolate manufacturers promised to start eliminating forced child labour.
[54] News reports as recently as 2018, indicate that "most child slaves on cocoa farms (Cote d’Ivoire and Ghana) come from Mali and Burkina Faso, two of the poorest nations on Earth.
The suit accused Barry Callebaut, Cargill, The Hershey Company, Mars, Mondelez, Nestlé, and Olam International, of knowingly engaging in forced labour, and the plaintiffs sought damages for unjust enrichment, negligent supervision, and intentional infliction of emotional distress.
[49] A survey conducted by U.S. Department of Labour indicates that in 2005, 92 percent of children between the ages of 5 and 15 are involved in heavy load carrying work in the cocoa industry, which can cause open wounds.
For instance, children carrying out light, non-hazardous tasks on the family farm for a limited period of time, under supervision, and without compromising their schooling, is considered as acceptable child work.
By contrast, activities such as carrying heavy loads or using chemicals are considered as "unacceptable forms of child labour", because they are physically dangerous for children.
[69] In the 2000s, some chocolate producers began to engage in fair trade initiatives, to address concerns about the marginalization of cocoa labourers in developing countries.
Traditionally, Africa and other developing countries received low prices for their exported commodities such as cocoa, which caused poverty to abound.
[72] 2019 research from the International Cocoa Initiative found a strong correlation between higher quality education and lower prevalence of child labour.
Senator Tom Harkin proposed an addition to an agriculture bill to label qualified chocolate and cocoa products as "slave free".
[76] Instead, the chocolate manufacturers reached agreement with the Congressmen to create the Harkin–Engel Protocol[77] to remove child forced labour from the industry by July 2005.
[77] As another result of the Protocol, the International Cocoa Initiative was created to improve the lives of children in cocoa-growing communities, safeguarding their rights and contributing to the elimination of child labour by supporting the acceleration and scale-up of child-centred community development and of responsible supply chain management throughout the cocoa sector.
[17][80] This extension allowed the cocoa industry more time to implement the Protocol including creating a certification system to address the worst forms of child labour for half of the growing areas in Côte d'Ivoire and Ghana.
[80] The European Union passed a resolution in 2012 to fully implement the Harkin–Engel Protocol and fight child labour in cocoa production.
[83] The resolution was criticized by the International Labor Rights Forum for having no legally binding measures and two major chocolate manufacturers claimed they were addressing the problem.
[83] The industry's pledge to reduce child labour in Cote d’Ivoire and Ghana by 70%, as per the Framework of Action in 2010, had not been met as of late 2015; the deadline was again extended, to 2020.
[84] Companies who claimed to be addressing child labour were asked to provide evidence for this and were scored according to whether their reports were external or internal, whether just numbers or actual impact was measured, and how recently the study was undertaken.
