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New Years Resolutions
I don’t usually do New Years Resolutions, but I do set goals. One of my goals is to give up coffee and too many sweet treats. I sat down at the beginning of December and decided a few things, these two being major things to contriubte to a healthier me.
Today I was reading about where coffee and chocolate come from. It is a sad and interesting read that made me want to give up all the more.
Slave to coffee & chocolate Last modified: Wednesday 14th June, 2006 
In brief
Many people joke that they couldn’t survive without coffee or chocolate, but for many farmers in poor countries, these products really are essential to their survival.If people knew some of the stories behind the morning cuppa or chocolate fix, it might not taste so good.
The bitter side of coffee and chocolate
The global price of both coffee and cocoa beans has fallen. Too many farmers, seeing these crops as a good way of earning money, have entered the market, resulting in an oversupply. This dramatic drop in price has a serious impact on farmers, and particularly children.But prices haven’t dropped at the retail end. A cup of coffee continues to escalate in price. It is payments to the farmers that have dropped, while those they sell to, the middlemen, are making big profits.
Coffee
Out of a $3 cappuccino that you might buy at a café, only 3 cents goes to the farmer who grew the beans. (1)Large coffee estate owners usually sell at market prices set by the New York Coffee Exchange. However, most small farmers sell directly to middlemen exporters who may pay below market price for their harvests.
These small farmers may not even get enough to cover production costs, let alone school fees or books for their children.
Often their children, even those as young as eight or nine, can be forced to go to work on the plantations to help their families produce a larger crop to make more money.
The situation is predicted to affect 125 million people, who may already be living below the poverty level, through unemployment, hunger and migration.
Chocolate
In West Africa’s cocoa region, which produces 70 percent of the world’s cocoa, over 284,000 children work in hazardous conditions. (2)The fall in price of raw cocoa has forced small farmers in the cocoa region to cut labour costs, in order to make enough from their crops.
This has been linked to the re-emergence of slave labour. Over 15,000 children are suspected to have been sold into forced labour on northern Ivory Coast plantations in recent years.
These children – mostly under 14 – are involved in dangerous work, including spraying pesticides, using machetes and carrying heavy loads. They have no access to education or health care. Physical abuse is also common.
“The beatings were a part of my life,” said a former bonded labourer, Aly Diabate. If he fell while carrying the heavy bags of cocoa, no-one would help. “Instead, they beat you and beat you until you picked it up again.” (3)
The situation is so serious that in 2002, an International Cocoa Initiative was launched to bring the international chocolate industry, aid agencies and corporate stakeholders together over the issue.
Making coffee and chocolate sweeter
Thankfully, it is possible to do something without giving up coffee and chocolate.Fair trade
Purchasing fair trade products is one option. Products can only carry the ‘fair trade’ label if they have been produced without unfair labour practices, such as low wages and child labour. Fair trade aims to ensure growers or producers are paid a decent wage.Coffee drinkers can join organisations like People for Fair Trade and order fair trade coffee from places like Tradewinds. They can also campaign for fair trade coffee to be sold in supermarkets, local coffee shops and big coffee chains.
Fair trade chocolate blocks and drinking chocolate are sold under brand names such as Green & Black’s at Coles supermarkets, and from an increasing number of other major supermarkets.
Ethically produced chocolate is also sold at some health food and organic outlets and online through Oxfam Community Aid Abroad.
Global trading reform
However, in addition to buying fair trade products, global trading reform is vital to improve practices across the coffee and cocoa industries.Tariffs – taxes on imported goods – on the more profitable processed cocoa makes it difficult for poor countries to compete on the global market.
The European Union has tariffs of 0.5 percent on raw cocoa imports. But for the more profitable processed cocoa products, they impose a 30.6 percent tariff.
The United States and Japan have no tariffs on raw cocoa imports but have high tariffs on the final product. (4)
These high import costs, limit poor farmers to exporting only the cheaper raw cocoa, rather than more profitable processed products like chocolate.
The global trading system in coffee and cocoa must change to make trade fair for all countries – rich and poor.
Click to find out more on ethical coffee, chocolate and consumption.
Endnote(s):
(1) National Catholic Reporter (6 September 2004) Depressed coffee prices yield suffering in poor countries [Online] Available at: http://www.natcath.com/NCR_Online/
archives/020703/020703a.htm
(2) Anti-slavery (16 September 2004) Take action on cocoa: background [Online] Available at: http://www.antislavery.org/homepage/
campaign/cocoabackground.htm
(3) Raghavan, Sudarsan, & Chatterjee, Sudarsan (2001) “How your chocolate may be tainted”, Knight Ridder Newspapers, 24 June 2001, [Online] Available: http://www.realcities.com/mld/krwashington/
news/special_packages/2060179.htm
(4) International Labour Organization (6 September 2004) ILO welcomes new foundation to eliminate abusive child and forced labour practices in cocoa farming [Online] Available at: http://www.ilo.org/public/english/bureau/inf/pr
/2002/34.htm
(5) McCorriston, Steve; Sexton, Richard J; Sheldon, Ian M; (2004) Vertical Market Structure, Commodity Exports and Trade Reform, Paper to be presented at 7th Annual Conference on Global Economic Analysis, World Bank, Washington, USA, 17-19 June 2004, p. 12. [Online] Available at: http://www.gtap.agecon.purdue.edu/resources/
download/1882.pdf
Story from World Vision Connect, a World Vision Australia initiativehttp://www.worldvision.com.au/wvconnect/content.asp?topicID=97