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GreenMoney Journal - publishing since 1992
Fall 2010 issue
Socially Responsible Investing – Better Companies, Better Communities
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About Chocolaty Goodness
Ted Ketcham
Organic and Fair Trade chocolate sounded like a pretty good assignment. Back when Hal covered
organic coffee blends for us a couple issues ago there was a trip to Costa Rica involved. Since
chocolate comes from exotic equatorial regions I mentally dusted my passport and searched for the
sun block.
"You can go up to Huckelberry's (our Spokane, Washington version of Whole Foods) and buy all the
chocolate bars you want," said GreenMoney publisher Cliff Feigenbaum from his office in Santa Fe.
OK, no need for suitcases or airline tickets. Still, free chocolate is a fine
next-best-thing and having an excuse to eat a lot of it sounded like great fun.
So I
bought a fistful of Huckleberry's dark chocolate selections, and with a little help from my
organizer-daughter we created a "chocolaty goodness" taste test score sheet for all those dark
chocolate brands, enlisting family, friends, and even my wife's book club in choosing some
favorites. We'll get back to this.
Some Unfortunate Chocolate Badness
Sadly, I learned in my research that there's nothing "fun" about the world's chocolate
production among major traders in cocoa commodities.
Seventy percent of the world's cocoa
grows in West Africa, 41 percent in the Ivory Coast. A century ago the world was scandalized to
learn that Cadbury's, the then leading chocolate manufacturer, relied upon slave plantations there
for their cocoa.
And things did not improve much in a hundred years. In 2001 a
Knight-Ridder exposé showed that global cocoa/chocolate trade companies have done little to address
forced labor. Journalists from the U.S. and Britain documented the widespread enslavement of
adolescent and teenage boys in the Ivory Coast.
To make a profit at the low prices offered
in a market dominated by Nestlés, Cargill, Archer Daniels Midland, and Hershey's among others,
labor contractors (basically human traffickers) entice youngsters with the promise of good jobs to
sign up for seasons of hard work.
Thousands of children ages 9 to 16 work 12 to 14 hours
a day spreading pesticides, carrying sharp machetes up 25 foot trees, and hauling heavy bags of
beans. They are offered little shelter and barely fed. Those who try to leave may be beaten.
From an April 2, 2007 report on BBC news: "They are being kept out of school and many have
untreated wounds on their legs, where they have cut themselves when working in the cocoa
plantations.
'I used to go to school,' said Marc Yao Kwame, who works with his brother
Fabrice on a remote farm. 'But my father has no one to work on the farm, so he took me out of
school.'"
Brian Campbell, an attorney for International Labor Rights Forum (ILRF) in
Washington, D.C., shared West African government estimates that there are at least 12,000
forced-labor children and hundreds of thousands of child workers currently harvesting the cocoa
crops that lead to our mainstream chocolate candy.
Growers claim that they're forced to
such practices in order to compete. Global cocoa and chocolate buyers claim that they're at the
mercy of a market that many consider to be controlled by those same buyers. In any auction the
biggest spenders set the bar. Among the world's biggest buyers: Cargill and Archer Daniels Midland.
In the meantime, there are today child laborers who have never tasted chocolate, and in
fact do not realize that the football-sized cacao pods they harvest twice a year with their
dangerous machetes have anything to do with chocolate candy.
The Harkin-Engel
Protocol
After the Knight-Ridder articles, U.S. Senator Tom Harkin (of Iowa) and
U.S. Congressman Eliot Engel (of New York) knew they had to stop this practice. "When I learned of
children being sold into slavery to work in the cocoa fields of the Ivory Coast, I was horrified,"
Engel said. In 2001, after months of public and governmental pressure, representatives of the
largest corporations in the cocoa and chocolate industry signed the Harkin-Engel Protocol, wherein
the companies promised to work "wholeheartedly" to "eliminate the worst forms of child labor" and
to create by June 2005 a certification system to verify that this was being accomplished.
According to Boston's Equal Exchange, the protocol gave the industry years of relief from
pressure or scrutiny as they repeatedly assured the public that they were dedicated to solving the
problem. Little, says Equal Exchange's Rodney North, has actually been accomplished in the last
seven years. Even Sen. Harking and Rep. Engel had to publicly admit this when the industry missed
the protocol's original July 2005 deadline.
Though the industry received three more years
to address the problem, the news is still unsettling. This winter ('07-'08) the journalist Cristian
Parenti, writing for Fortune magazine, also traveled to Ivory Coast and found little evidence of a
serious effort to tackle the twin problems of forced child labor and chronic poverty among the
region's cocoa growers. Parenti writes "Yet today child workers, many under the age of 10, are
everywhere. Sometimes they're visibly scarred from their work. In the village of Lilo a young boy
carrying a machete ambled along a road with a bandaged shin. He said he had cut his leg toiling in
a cocoa patch."
Current Battle in the U.S. Congress
Senator
Harkin has proposed in this year's Farm Bill that passed the Senate a provision that would direct
the Dept. of Labor and the Dept. of Agriculture to work together to develop a voluntary no-child
labor, no-forced labor certification program for agricultural imports. The timing is good because
beginning this year, the Department of Labor is creating a list of products, and the countries they
are from, in which child or forced labor was likely used. The voluntary certification program would
provide importers and producers with a way to differentiate their products and have them labeled
free of forced or child labor, allow consumers to avoid purchasing forced child labor products, and
also provide certification companies, such as Fair Trade certifiers or organic certifiers
additional product lines with recognized standards for monitoring and certifying whether child or
forced labor was involved in their production.
ILRF's Campbell reports that Cargill and
ADM have been on a lobbying blitz to get the Harkin's provision, (Sec. 3104,) out of the Farm Bill
in the conference committee that has been meeting for the past few weeks.
This stalling
behavior is consistent with North's observations. He describes a pattern among the global chocolate
manufacturers of first denial that a problem exists, then claims of "making progress and token
gestures designed to buy time, followed by vigorous lobbying to avoid any actual responsibility for
change.
The Good News: Fair Trade Chocolate
The good news, of
course, is that chocolate lovers can continue their cocoa-flavored affairs without supporting child
or slave labor. Fair Trade Certified™ cocoa (and chocolate made with Fair Trade cocoa) offers an
alternative. Fair Trade cocoa can only be sourced from democratically organized co-ops of
small-scale farmers that abide by a number of critical social and environmental requirements,
including the core International Labor Organization covenants prohibiting forced labor and
excessive child labor. By supporting co-operatives Fair Trade importers help otherwise vulnerable
farmers to collectively increase the bargaining power in the market, and to professionalize their
operations while creating locally rooted business entities suitable for certification and
monitoring. Co-op certification creates peer pressure and self-policing to ensure that all co-op
members abide by the rules.
Rodney North explains that Fair Trade began fifty years back
when some development and solidarity organizations made a commitment to work directly with
disadvantaged peoples in poor countries to market their handicrafts, and later crops, directly to
consumers. By establishing direct relationships these organizations have been able to offer market
information, affordable credit, stability, as well as higher prices, while offering competitive
products.
Later, organizations like IFAT (International Fair Trade Association) were
formed to promote Fair Trade and share best practices. With the introduction of Fair Trade
certification by organizations like TransFair USA, agricultural commodities such as coffee, cocoa
and chocolate began to carry a third party seal that would assure consumers that a product was
fairly traded. TransFair ( http://www.transfairusa.org ) is the US arm of FLO (Fairtrade Labelling
Organizations International), the global umbrella organization that establishes the criteria for
Fair Trade certification and monitors adherence.
"Consumers need to know," concludes
North, "that the Fair Trade seal is applied on a product-by-product basis. Some companies buy and
sell only a small fraction of the cocoa and chocolate, or coffee or tea, etc., on Fair Trade terms,
so be sure to look for the black and white seal."
Organic Chocolates - the
multiple benefits and a few of the leaders.
Organic chocolate and cocoa products,
in order to be certified as such, are grown without the use of pesticides, which is good for
consumers and great for the workers who in non-organic operations rarely have access to the gloves
and respirators suggested by pesticide manufacturers.
Additionally, chemical free farming
methods demand smaller plots, often under a shade canopy that preserves critical elements of the
rainforests with its habitat for birds and bio-diversity of all plants and animals.
Certified organic foods contain nothing that is genetically modified. Organic certification
also ensures the milk powder is free of the Bovine Growth Hormone often given to cows to increase
production.
Some chocolate companies, including those mentioned below, may offer only some
organically labeled products, but virtually all of them claim to seek the best quality ingredients.
Following are some examples among many of organic chocolate providers whose benefits go
beyond simply being organic. See below for a list of many others.
Dagoba Organic
Chocolates: Their products and practices are based on "Full Circle Sustainability." Their
goals include quality materials - free of pesticides and growth hormones, ecologically sound
methods - preserving and enhancing the environment, equity for the growers in accordance with Fair
Trade standards, and support for the local, regional and national communities in which Dagoba does
business.
(In what some call a "trend" among organic food producers, Dagoba was purchased
in late 2006 by Artisan Confections, a division of Hershey's chocolate. As of April, 2008, Dagoba's
founder, Frederick Schilling, is, according to the company's public relations firm, "out of the
country and no longer working for Dagoba.")
Endangered Species: In
addition to dealing in high quality, ethically traded chocolate, this manufacturer, founded in
1993, "donates 10 percent of net profits to help support species, habitat, and humanity."
Equal Exchange: A pioneer since 1986 in fair traded coffee, Equal Exchange has
also emerged as a leader among organic fair trade chocolate products. Equal exchange trades
exclusively with farmer cooperatives CONACADO in the Dominican Republic and CACVRA in Peru. Their
internet site offers abundant information about Fair Trade certification and the chocolate growing
and manufacturing process. Equal Exchange is also a leader in lobbying and educational resources to
bring the Fair Trade message to as many consumers as possible. Be sure to visit their website.
And now, the results of our Chocolately Goodness taste-test:
Sorry.
The sampling was great fun. Delicious, actually. But the results were inconclusive and yes,
unscientific. And worse, my own personal favorite chocolate bar was clearly not the choice of many
others. In fact, each dark chocolate brand was enjoyed by some and unappreciated by others. Chewed
and/or eschewed one might say. Our single descriptor "chocolaty goodness" seemed to need no
clarification, but some tasters rated the samples on a ten scale (as asked) while others
rank-ordered them. (Granted the directions could have been clearer.) Thus, we have two conclusions:
First, Chocolate is an exquisite, tasty and ultimately subjective experience. Second, I'll never
make it in the product testing business.
But here's the really good news: you'll just have
to do your own chocolate research. Or do a sampling test with your friends - it really livens up a
book club meeting, I'm told.
And by purchasing Fair Trade and Organic chocolate you'll be
voting for an international cocoa supply line that emphasizes quality cocoa products untainted by
human suffering and ecological harm. You'll pay a little more to do a great deal more for the
planet.
Enjoy your chocolate.
Now Some Chocolate Resources:
Co-op America ( http://www.coopamerica.com ) lists the following importers,
manufacturers and retailers as sources for Fair Trade cocoa &/or chocolate:
A World Away, Atlantic Beach, FL 904/247-4411, http://www.aworldaway.net
Alter Eco, San Francisco, CA 415/701-1212, http://www.altereco-usa.com
Ananse Village, Fort Bragg, CA 877/242-4467, http://www.anansevillage.com
Bean North Coffee Roasting Company, Whitehorse, Yukon Territory,
Canada?867/667-4145, http://www.beannorth.com
Café Humana, Seattle, WA,
866/7-HUMANA, www.cafehumana.com
Dean's Beans, Orange, MA, 800/325-3008,
http://www.deansbeans.com
Divine Chocolate USA, Washington, DC, 202/332-8913,
http://www.divinechocolateusa.com
Equal Exchange, West Bridge, MA,
774/776-7333, http://www.equalexchange.coop
Equita, Pittsburgh, PA
412/353-0109, http://www.shopequita.com
Fair World Gallery, West Des Moines,
IA, 515/277-7550, http://www.fairworldgallery.com
Fair World Marketplace,
DeWitt, NY 315/446-0326, http://www.fairworldmarketplace.com
Global Exchange Fair Trade
Store, San Francisco, CA 800/505-4410, http://store.gxonlinestore.org
Grounds
for Change, Poulsbo, WA, 800/796-6820, http://www.groundsforchange.com
Ithaca
Fine Chocolates, Ithaca, NY, 607/257-7954, www.ithacafinechocolates.com
La
Siembra Cooperativa, Inc., Ottowa, Ontario, Canada, 613/235-6122,
http://www.cocoacamino.com
Providence Coffee, Faribault, MN, 507/412-1733,
http://www.providencecoffee.com
SERRV International, Madison, WI,
800/423-0071, http://www.serrv.org/divine
Shaman Chocolates, Soquel, CA,
877/990-3337, http://www.shamanchocolates.com
Sweet Earth Organic Chocolates,
San Luis Obispo, CA. 805/544-7759, http://www.sweetearthchocolates.com
Yachana
Gourmet, Batavia, NY. 716/343-4490, http://www.yachanagourmet.com
The
following Organic and/or Fair Trade chocolates, though not among Co-op America's (some are imported
from Switzerland, Belgium, Germany or Italy, for example) were available at Huckleberry
Market:
Rapunzel Swiss Chocolate, Imported from Switzerland by
Organic Brands LLC, NY, NY 10011, http://www.rapunzel.com
Narragansett Seeds of
Change, PO Box 15700, Santa Fe, NM 87592, www.seedsofchange.com (Imported from Italy)
Vivani Premium Organic, Imported from Germany by InterNatural Foods LLC,
Bloomfield, NJ 07003, http://www.worldwidechocolate.com
Newman's Own
Organics, P O Box 2098, Aptos, CA 95001, http://www.newmansownorganics.com
Endangered Species, 5846 W. 73rd St., Indianapolis, IN 46278,
http://www.chocolatebar.com
Tropical Source, nSpiredtm Natural Foods,
San Leandro, CA 94577, http://www.tropicalsourcecandy.com
Dagoba Organic
Chocolate, 1105 Benson Way, Ashland, OR 97520, http://www.dagobachocolate.com
*Chocolove, P O Box 18357, Boulder, CO 80308, http://www.chocolove.com
(Note: two Chocolove
bars, the 61% and 73% cocoa contents, are certified organic by the Colorado Dept. of Agriculture)
Theo Chocolate, 3400 Phinney Avenue N. Seattle WA 98103,
http://www.theochocolate.com
And coming to us late in the game was:
Terra Nostra Organic, 2385 Burrard St., Vancouver, BC V6J 3J2 Canada,
http://www.terranostrachocolate.com
Terra Nostra products are certified Equitable Trade ("Fair
Trade & Beyond). For more information see http://www.equitabletrade.org
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