Behind Ivory Coast's Successful Cocoa Plantations are Children
At least 68 children have been rescued by authorities from a trafficking syndicate on several cocoa plantations across the Ivory Coast.
An Ivorian police officer detain two children caught drying cocoa in the sun in the village of Pogreagui in Meagui, on May 6, 2021 during an operation to remove children from cocoa plantations. - The "Nawa 2" operation, which was widely publicised in the media, was carried out at the beginning of May in the Soubré region (400 km west of Abdjan), the country's main cocoa-growing area, and was aimed at convincing the Ivorian authorities to take action against child labour in the cocoa industry, a scourge that has been denounced by international NGO's for the last 20 years.
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Ivory Coast is one of the leading cocoa producers in the world, alongside Ghana, with 70 percent of the production carried by the two countries. However, child labour, trafficking and even slavery remain the major challenges of this thriving industry. The recent police operation was the first since 2014 due to a lack of funding and resources although there have been 600 successful prosecutions to date, Reuters reports. One hundred police officers were mobilised over the course of just two days.
While the exact figures vary, the number of children involved in the Ivory Coast's cocoa trade has been estimated to be as high as 1.2 million although there are reports of more conservative figures. Unfortunately, the child trafficking is also closely associated with slavery as many children are forced to work on these plantations without pay and under poor conditions.
Given that the Ivory Coast's cocoa industry supplies some of the largest chocolate manufacturers in the world, this raises questions around what steps the chocolate industry should be taking to remedy the crisis in much the same way the diamond and clothing industries have been indicted for human rights abuses with regards to the source of their respective labour forces.
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