Getting to the Source of Slave-free Chocolate

Valentine's Day is near, a holiday focused on love and chocolate. And while our love affair with gorging on chocolate isn't limited to February 14, the fact that billions of dollars of chocolate is sold around this time each year (and the focus on loving one another) provides an important opportunity to explore the connection between chocolate and slavery.

There's no shortage of evidence that much of the world's chocolate is still produced using child labor and slavery. (The Food Empowerment Project (FEP) offers a terrific, succinct overview of the issue.) And the chocolate industry has been slow to take positive action, though some companies are taking some action to ensure their cocoa is fairly and sustainably sourced.

I've been aware of the connection between chocolate and slavery for several years, and I've proudly purchased fair trade, organic, vegan chocolate as a most good, least harm option. However, I've recently discovered that not even the fair trade label can guarantee a product free from slavery. According to research conducted by the Food Empowerment Project(FEP), some fair trade companies have had to suspend their contracts with suppliers in West Africa because it was discovered they were using child labor.

So what's a person who wants to satisfy their cravings for cruelty- and slave-free chocolate to do? Food Empowerment Project says:

"The truth is that consumers today have no sure way of knowing if the chocolate they are buying involved the use of child labor or slave labor. There are many different labels on chocolate bars today, such as Fair Trade Certified, however, no single label can guarantee that the chocolate was made without the use of exploitive labor."

FEP has created a list of vegan chocolate that they feel comfortable recommending, based on information they received (or didn't) from several chocolate companies.

In 2009 the International Labor Rights Forum released a scorecard (pdf) of how they rate various chocolate companies, and Green America has also released a scorecard (pdf) for their grades of various companies.

The best way we can try to make the most humane chocolate choice is to contact companies, ask them specific questions and tell them (repeatedly) to ensure that they're cocoa is produced sustainably, humanely, and fairly.

~ Marsha

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