The news outlets today were all in a tizzy about the announcement by Mars, the USDA and IBM of a five year project to sequence and analyze the cocoa genome. Many of these articles started out with the line “To save chocolate lovers from the agony of a potential candy bar shortage …” (Washington Post). Others, like Mars’ global director of plant science Shapiro, invoked the fate of the African cocoa farmers, claiming that the results of the project would bring economic stability to those farmers by making cocoa more pest and disease resistant. So it’s all about doing science in the name of the greater humanitarian good. Oh, and also to keep chocolate lovers happy. Continue reading “Mars to Sequence Cocoa Genome”
Divine Chocolate Wins Ethical Business Award
“I want to change the world with chocolate and doing with chocolate that’s great makes it easier..” That’s what Sophie Tranchell, managing director of Divine Chocolate, told me a year ago during an interview for my book on cocoa and chocolate. It seems she’s well on her way. A couple of weeks ago, my favorite chocolate company won the UK Observer’s 2008 Ethical Business award. The paper gave the following citation:
Owned by Ghanaian co-operative Kuapa Kokoo (meaning ‘good cocoa growers’), Divine turns over £10.7m per year – and 45,000 people in 1,200 villages get a share of the profits and make a collective decision on how to spend it. The award – coinciding with Divine’s 10th birthday – celebrates this empowering trade model.
The observer also posted a video about Divine. Continue reading “Divine Chocolate Wins Ethical Business Award”
A Cocoa Clean-up in the Côte d’Ivoire?
Last week several news outlets (Agence France Press and Bloomberg, among others) reported that 23 officials related to the cocoa sector in the Côte d’Ivoire had been arrested on charges of fraud and corruption. Among the individuals arrested was Lucien Tape Do, the head of the Bourse du Café et du Cacao, the key Ivorian cocoa agency. Other suspects worked for the FDPCC – Fonds de Développement et de Promotion des Activités des Producteurs de Café et de Cacao – and the FRC – Fonds the Régulation et Control. Continue reading “A Cocoa Clean-up in the Côte d’Ivoire?”
A Sad Day for the Children of Cocoa Farmers
I am very disappointed but I should have expected it. Yesterday, in a joint statement with the Chocolate Industry, Senator Harkin and Congressman Engel basically ratified the very limited efforts of the industry to combat child labor in the cocoa sector. So, for all practical purposes, the crucial part of the 2001 Harkin-Engel protocol, that the industry establish a “credible, mutually acceptable, voluntary, industry-wide standards of public certification, consistent with applicable federal law, that cocoa beans and their derivative products have been grown and/or processed without any of the worst forms of child labor” is dead. Continue reading “A Sad Day for the Children of Cocoa Farmers”
Are Speculators the Problem?
Last Friday, the New York Times reported that the increase in commodity prices and the resulting increase in prices ordinary consumers pay has attracted the attention of regulators and politicians. The specific target are speculators who are suspected of having driven up futures prices. The article goes on to repeat the arguments made by the advocates of futures trading–that speculators are necessary to make the futures market work and that there is a big difference between a speculator and someone who manipulates the market.
I thought that it might be good to explain how the futures market works, something the article fails to do. Continue reading “Are Speculators the Problem?”
