Chocolate: The Bitter Truth - Industry, Fair Trade, and Labor Report

This report analyzes the chocolate industry, addressing child labor, fair trade, and the economic conditions of cocoa farmers. It examines the number of cocoa pods needed for chocolate production, the reliance on cocoa in Ghana and Ivory Coast, and the social and environmental challenges in Burkina Faso. The report explores the exploitation of child labor, the effectiveness of Fairtrade, and the distribution of profits in the cocoa supply chain. It highlights issues like climate change, deforestation, and diseases affecting cocoa production, along with the low wages received by farmers. The report also discusses the empowerment of women in cocoa farming and the major cocoa-producing countries. The conclusion emphasizes the need to address challenges in cocoa farming to improve farmer livelihoods and combat child labor. The provided assignment solution is a comprehensive exploration of the ethical and economic issues within the chocolate industry, offering insights into the challenges and potential solutions for a more sustainable and equitable system.

Chocolate - The Bitter Truth
A single bar of chocolate is made with 500 beans of cocoa. A pod is able to produce
about 40 cocoa beans. Therefore, to make 7 bars of chocolate, about 88 pods are used to
make 7 bars of chocolate. Ghana and Ivory Coast are some of the major producers of cocoa.
More than 2 million people in these two countries depend on cocoa for their survival.
Burkina Faso is one of the low income countries in west Africa. The country
experiences climatic shocks relating to changes in rainfall and therefore affecting their
farming activities. The country relies on social development to boost its productivity and
competitiveness on the exportations.
Fatao is a 12-year-old coffee boy, who works on the cocoa farms. After works, the
slave masters or parents pocket his wages. The involvement of children in the cocoa farming
due to poor wages and prices to farmers have causes the Fatao,s situation. In Côte d’Ivoire
only, about 1.4 million children are engaged in cocoa harvesting. Fairtrade is a campaign
which is aimed at addressing and discouraging the use of the children in cocoa harvesting and
farming and their slavery in this sector. Personally, the Fairtrade is unable to address these
major issues concerning child slavery in cocoa industry. The system has been unable to
address the challenges at the grassroots and focuses on advertising to the world and not the
root.
From bean to bar in Ivory Coast, a country built on cocoa
According to N’Zi Kanga Remi, the sustainability of cocoa in Ivory Coast has been
affected by the climate change, deforestation and diseases, which the government is trying to
address. Being a dependent crop, child labour crisis has also emerged with more than 2
million children being engaged in working on cocoa farms. About 6 million people depend
on this crop in the country but their payment is awful from the crop they have known for

ages. Statistics shows that the farmers, who are producers receive about 6% of the value of
the final product. The rest of the value of cocoa is share between the branded manufacturers
and retailers who share 44% and 35% respectively. Further, the Fairtrade chocolate products
are able to claim 13% of the cocoa price rising lamentations on cocoa farmers. Empowering
women to take the front stand in cocoa farming has been done and still an ongoing process.
The campaign of “She deserves a living income” has been done. She also empowers women
through Fairtrade Premium to venture into other business and farming areas such as poultry
and egg production.
Where Does Chocolate Come From? We've Got the Answers
Different countries produce cocoa and according to statistics, Ivory Coast, Indonesia,
Ghana, Nigeria, Cameroon, Brazil, Ecuador, Dominican Republic, and Peru are major
producers. In the year 2014/15, these countries produced about 4.2 million tons which is
about 70% of the world’s cocoa. More than 14 million people are engaged in growing cocoa
in these countries. The farmers pocket a wage of about $2 US per day and this can be seen in
the poor living conditions of the farmers.

Conclusion
Chocolate is one of the loved drinks over the world. Nevertheless, the state of the
farmers is alarming and for better production, the issues related to the cocoa faming need to
be addressed. Challenges in cocoa farming need to be addressed to achieve better prices for
the farmers. This will likely solve the child slavery in the industry as well.
Summaries
Farming of cocoa is increasing but issues of child labour slavery, diseases, change in
climate and deforestation are eminent in the industry. West Africa countries have the highest
cases of child labour in the cocoa industry. Fairtrade have been drafted to solve these
problems and it is yet to solve them. Poor wages have been blamed for the poor living
standards for the cocoa farmers.
The cocoa farmers receive less than 6% of the cocoa cost. More than 6 million people
are able to depend on cocoa farming for their living. The streets of Ivory Coast is full of

poverty with the area having large number of cocoa farmers. Mama cocoa has been
empowering women such as Awa Bamba who is a director of co-operative known as Cayat.