Cocoa Bean - Child Labor

Child Labor

The first allegations that child slavery is used in cocoa production appeared in 1998. In late 2000 a BBC documentary reported the use of enslaved children in the production of cocoa in West Africa. Other media followed by reporting widespread child slavery and child trafficking in the production of cocoa. According to a report by the International Labour Organization (ILO), in 2002, more than 109,000 children were working on cocoa farms in Côte d'Ivoire (Ivory Coast), some of them in "the worst forms of child labour". The ILO later reported that 200,000 children were working in the cocoa industry in Côte d'Ivoire in 2005. The 2005 ILO report failed to fully characterize this problem, but estimated that up to 6% of the 200,000 children involved in cocoa production could be victims of human trafficking or slavery. The cocoa industry was accused of profiting from child slavery and trafficking. The Harkin-Engel Protocol is an effort to end these practices. It was signed and witnessed by the heads of eight major chocolate companies, Harkin, Engel, Senator Herb Kohl, the ambassador of the Ivory Coast, the director of the International Programme on the Elimination of Child Labor, and others. It has, however, been criticized by some groups including the International Labor Rights Forum as an industry initiative which falls short.