A $3 chocolate bar would only increase in cost by 10-17 cents if Australian chocolate manufacturers were to pass on the full cost of combating child labour in their supply chain, according to research from World Vision to coincide with the International Day for the Abolition of Slavery.
The World Vision economic modelling estimated that globally, between US$2.17 billion and US$5.10 billion is required over 10 years to implement necessary interventions to ensure labour exploitation does not occur in West African cocoa fields, the source of 75% of the world’s cocoa beans. Cocoa is the main ingredient in our chocolate.
"To fund its share of the global industry, it is estimated that the Australian chocolate industry would need to contribute US$140 million over 10 years toward the total industry amount. This would represent less than 1.0% of Australian chocolate industry revenues per year," said Tim Costello, World Vision chief executive.
"To put that figure in perspective, the global revenue from chocolate sales – more than US$71 billion – is more than twice the combined GDP of Ghana and Ivory Coast. In the past four years the chocolate industry globally has spent US$39 million dollars – just .05% of global revenue – on combating child labour in cocoa production."
As part of the Don’t Trade Lives campaign, early in 2008 World Vision asked Australian chocolate manufacturers, through its industry body the Confectionery Manufacturers of Australasia (CMA), to produce a detailed, time-bound and fully costed plan of action by December 1st for combating the worst forms of child labour in West Africa.
"That deadline – like so many before it – passed yesterday with only an open letter that is light on detail but heavy on rhetoric," said Mr Costello.
"Even the industry’s own agreement to combat child labour, the Harkin-Engel protocol, has been consistently watered-down from its original intent," said Mr Costello. "Yesterday World Vision presented the CMA with a box of the 12,700 postcard petitions it received from Australians concerned about the chocolate industry’s inaction. Clearly Australians are willing to question their addiction to chocolate, but the chocolate manufacturers remain addicted to profit."
"The fact is, there is a lack of genuine will among chocolate manufacturers to cooperate to really, seriously combat child labour in West Africa," he said.
Mr Costello said the CMA had expressed doubts about the modelling, but challenged them to provide alternative figures.
"We’ve worked with the best information available to us. If the chocolate industry has a better assessment of the cost of eliminating child labour from its supply chain, they should provide that estimate – and then provide the money."
There are at least 284,000 children involved in the worst forms of child labour on cocoa farms in West Africa, mostly in Ivory Coast. They work in hazardous conditions, are unprotected, unfree or have been trafficked.
Of these 284,000 children, 152,700 work in pesticide application (142,300 in the Ivory Coast alone) and 146,000 children under 15 clear plantations using machetes.
For more information, visit
www.donttradelives.com.au.
Tim Costello is available for interview.
Media contact: Dominic McInerney: 03 9287 2257 or 0428 584 809