Labor Department Releases List of Goods Made With Child Labor

The U.S Department of labor released its 2009 list of goods made with child and/or forced labor. As readers of this blog will suspect, cocoa is on the list. Five West African countries, Cameroon, Côte d’Ivoire, Ghana, Guinea and Nigeria are listed as exporters of cocoa produced with child labor. In addition, the list singles out the Côte d’Ivoire and Nigeria as countries where cocoa is produced using forced labor (see p. 22 of the report).

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Hog Cycle at Work in India (and elsewhere)

Map of Tamil Nadu
Map of Tamil Nadu

A little item in the Economic Times of India shows yet again how market forces and agriculture don’t really work together very well. The article points out that due to the recent high prices for cocoa, cocoa cultivation has increased in India (I have reported on that earlier). The report focuses on the speed with which farmers in the Indian state of Tamil Nadu have adopted cocoa .

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Lateral Cocoa Trade

Liberia and Côte d'Ivoire in West Africa
Liberia and Côte d'Ivoire in West Africa

Here’s a bit of trade news that usually falls by the way side. After opening the border between Liberia and the Côte d’Ivoire, cocoa farmers in Liberia have discovered that they can get more money selling their crop to Ivorian dealers. The difference is significant–$2.50/kilo instead of $1.00/kilo in their home country.

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Today is World Day Against Child Labor

We are less than a week away from the tenth anniversary of the adoption of the International Labor Organization’s Convention 182–CONVENTION CONCERNING THE PROHIBITION AND IMMEDIATE ACTION FOR THE ELIMINATION OF THE WORST FORMS OF CHILD LABOUR. That convention codified in unmistakable terms what kind of work is impermissible for children under any circumstances.

Article 3

For the purposes of this Convention, the term “the worst forms of child labour” comprises:

  1. all forms of slavery or practices similar to slavery, such as the sale and trafficking of children, debt bondage and serfdom and forced or compulsory labour, including forced or compulsory recruitment of children for use in armed conflict;
  2. the use, procuring or offering of a child for prostitution, for the production of pornography or for pornographic performances;
  3. the use, procuring or offering of a child for illicit activities, in particular for the production and trafficking of drugs as defined in the relevant international treaties;
  4. work which, by its nature or the circumstances in which it is carried out, is likely to harm the health, safety or morals of children.

The International Labor Rights Fund reminds us that despite the convention, the worst forms of child labor are still rampant throughout the world. The World Day Against Child Labor is intended to reinforce our commitment to work for an abolition of these forms of child labor. Although the cocoa sector is not the only sector where such forms of child labor still exist, the focus of this blog is on cocoa. So check out the ILRF’s child labor awareness poster for cocoa. Print it and hang it up.

There are also excellent educational resources for classroom activities. And, if, like me, you like chocolate, here’s a scorecard to help you evaluate the supply chains of various chocolate companies.

India to be Cocoa Exporter?

I have mentioned before that the Westernization of the tastes of the Indian middle classes is part of the great hope of the chocolate industry. Much of the sustainability talk that is making the rounds these days is driven by the desire to produce enough cocoa at reasonable prices to capture that market. But a recent report makes me wonder how much there will be to capture.

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