HOW MUCH CHOCOLATE DO YOU EAT IN A WEEK?
One form of trafficking is the use of children to harvest the cocoa beans on farms in Cote D'Ivoire. These children are likely to be working to make your chocolate.
Where did all the chocolate come from?
Nearly half the world's chocolate
is made from cocoa grown in the Cote D'Ivoire, in Africa.
AN ESTIMATED 12,000 children have
been trafficked into cocoa farms in Cote D'Ivoire
When we buy chocolate we are being forced to be oppressors ourselves as we do not know that the chocolate we eat is 'traffik free'.
SHOW US THAT YOUR CHOCOLATE IS TRAFFIK FREE
We want all chocolate companies to be able to stamp onto their chocolate wrappers a symbol that tells us the cocoa beans have not been harvested by trafficked labour. We can then choose to eat chocolate that we know is TRAFFIK FREE.
Diabate and Traoré had left their village in Mali to go to Ivory Coast looking
for enough money to afford a bicycle, but they were sold to a man who had paid 50,000 West African Francs (about £50)
for the two boys and he wanted the money back—in labour.
The boys from Sirkasso met about twenty others in the same predicament and learned that no one was ever paid.
They slept in a rectangle-shaped mud hut that initially had windows but when some boys found they could escape during the
night, the windows were sealed shut. Diabate and Traoré remember eating mostly bananas, though they would gobble up the
cocoa beans, as others did, whenever they got the chance.
Many months passed, and the boys forgot what the purpose had once been for this adventure. Life became a struggle to exist,
then hardened to despair.
They gave up thinking of escape. They were under constant threat of beatings if they were caught trying to flee—and they had seen several boys treated savagely—they
were actually spooked by a belief that they were under a spell. Read more in Carol Off's book "Bitter Chocolate".
STOP THE TRAFFIK Chocolate Campaign is about ACTION and CHANGE.
The customer needs to know who picked the cocoa beans that make chocolate.
The retailer needs to know that their customers will change what they buy to force the chocolate industry to change their practices.
The chocolate manufacturers need to realise that this is the time to:
SIGN THE CHOCOLATE PLEDGE
KEEP THEIR ORIGINAL PROMISES
And GIVE US TRAFFIK FREE CHOCOLATE NOW
WHAT TO DO
Drown your town in coupons! Download our coupon by following this link. Give this to the retailer when you pay for your chocolate. Carry the coupons around in your wallet, purse or bag and every time you buy chocolate—give it in. Let all the chocolate retailers in your neighbourhood know why you are buying fair trade chocolate and encourage them to sign the pledge, join the campaign and provide chocolate that is TRAFFIK FREE.
Read, learn and support a project in West Africa which prevents the trade in children to work on cocoa farms and protect those that have been trafficked.
Follow this link for further chocolate campaign actions
BREAKING NEWS—CHOCOLATE CAMPAIGN SUCCESS
20% increase in fair-trade chocolate worldwide
This month, one member of the Chocolate Industry took a landmark decision that will result in a 20% increase in fair-trade—Traffik Free—chocolate worldwide.
Royal Verkade, a Dutch household name and subsidiary of United Biscuits, announced that they will be using 100% Fair Trade cocoa and sugar in their products from the autumn onwards. This is the first A-list chocolate producer worldwide to make the transition to Fair Trade production on a large scale and STOP THE TRAFFIK congratulates Royal Verkade for taking this decision.
Though many players were involved, a major turning point occurred during STOP THE TRAFFIK Netherlands and local NGO Fairfood's 'naming and shaming' campaign, linking Verkade with the worst forms of child labour in Ivory Coast. "Within a day we had a phone call from Fair Trade", states Antonie Fountain of STOP THE TRAFFIK Holland, "saying that Verkade had just called them to talk about the possibility of Fair Trade sourcing for their cocoa".
THIS IS BIG NEWS but It is critical we keep pressure up on this issue. We are making a difference. We will not stop until the trafficking has been STOPPED.
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THE COCOA PLEDGE
We want our chocolate to be Traffik Free. We have developed this into a Cocoa Pledge for use by the industry. Read it by going to the link at: www.stopthetraffik.org/chocolateDownloads/stt_pledge.pdf
We are calling all chocolate manufacturers and retailers to SIGN the pledge.
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GLOBAL CATCH UP
The Chocolate Campaign is global. All over the world from Australia to America, Belgium to Burnley there has been a grassroots movement of thousands of people fighting hard to raise awareness and fight for Traffik Free chocolate. Every day it is growing.
WHAT ARE WE WAITING FOR?
Do you remember the ICI (International Cocoa Initiative)? This is the body that was set up in 2001 as part of the Harkin-Engel protocol, to help fight human trafficking in the cocoa supply chain. Although the ICI has worked to establish community projects to fight trafficking, Industry has not supported them enough to make a significant impact. Industry has also failed to deliver on certifying that only farms free from trafficked labour can supply the cocoa that makes our chocolate. Now Industry only talks about making a survey and reporting progress—a far cry from the certification that they promised. We are placing our Cocoa Pledge, which has growing international support (see the web site), as the best response to a failed industry protocol.