Tony’s Chocolonely
A chocolate company was born by a chocolate criminal named Teun van de Keuken, a Dutch TV producer and journalist. His research for a TV series led him to the revelation that no chocolate factory in the world was truly slave-free and he decided to prosecute himself for being complicit in maintaining child slavery as he too had unwittingly consumed those tainted chocolates. Thus, Tony’s Chocolonely came to be; Tony was Tuen’s English name and ‘lonely’ signified the lone battle he fought against modern slavery in the chocolate industry.
Cadbury
Cadbury has spearheaded initiatives that improved the workers’ living conditions - pension and medical service for its entire staff. Most notably, they established the Bournville estate, a residential community built for the workers that boasted homes with gardens, educational institutions, and recreational facilities except pubs. Despite these progressive efforts, cocoa
plantation workers who supplied beans to Cadbury have historically been neglected, a practice that has persisted even under new leadership - Mondelez International.
Slavery in the industry
The global production of cocoa has doubled over the past three decades with the majority of the cocoa coming from four Western African countries - Côte d’Ivoire, Ghana,
Cameroon, and Nigeria. The Cocoa Barometer Report (2020) highlights the challenges this has brought forth - “deforestation and child labour, fueled by the poverty of the majority of farmers, and driven by weak rural infrastructure, a lack of transparency and accountability.”
Tony uncovered widespread sustainability issues in the industry. While various certifications exist that claim to signify ethical labour practices and offer premium payments (an additional amount of money on top of the market price) to farmers, several issues undermine their effectiveness. Firstly, even with the premium, the income of cocoa farmers remains below the poverty line. Secondly, certified and uncertified beans are not segregated during transportation and processing. Thus, companies stand in front of the mountain of beans maximizing profit, whilst exploiting those who stand behind it.
Tony’s believed it was essential to build a role model for the chocolate industry to initiate change, and developed 5 principles to eliminate slavery:
Rule 1: Traceable beans
Tony’s maintains transparency by teaming with FamerLine, a Ghanaian software company to digitize documentation. This resulted in the formation of an app called BeanTracker that updates all the players in the value chain about the cocoa’s journey as well as allowing farmers to expect their payments accordingly.
Rule 2: A fair price
Tony’s Chocolonely bridges the gap between the market price and the living income by paying a premium that consists of 2 components: FairTrade premium and an additional Tony’s premium. Using a mathematical model, they annually determine the living income and calculate the premium accordingly. This is paid directly to the cooperatives to ensure that other players in the supply chain do not receive a percentage.
Rule 3: Strong farmers
New partner cooperatives undergo an analysis to identify their strengths and weaknesses, which are used to develop tailored improvement plans.
Furthermore, the cooperative independently decides how to spend the premium they receive. While they are encouraged to create 5-year community improvement plans, Tony’s does want the entire premium to be dedicated solely to this purpose. The maintenance cost will aggregate, and chocolate industries and governments are expected to set up welfare schemes as well.
Rule 4: The long term
Tony’s ensures income security by signing a collaboration agreement of a minimum of 5 years, which includes a transparency clause. This allows them to share it with potential buyers, thus providing an added advantage during negotiations.
Their long-term relationship also helps combat illegal child labour through the Child Monitoring and Remediation System (CLMRS) which aims to rectify the situation within 6 to 12 months. The solutions can range from providing a birth certificate to facilitate school enrollment, giving them bicycles to travel to school faster to constructing schools closer to their home.
Rule 5: Improved productivity and better quality cocoa
With the premium, farmers are empowered to invest in production resources like fertilisers and new cocoa trees. To determine the required amount of resources, Tony's Chocolonely maps the farm boundaries using GPS technology. This mapping process also helps identify the farm's location. In case the farm is situated in a protected rainforest or woodland, the local authorities and Tony’s relocate the farmer and replant the forest.
A look at the practices of the largest buyer of cocoa, Cadbury will provide evidence for Tony’s lone battle against chocolate slavery.
Cadbury discovered illegal child labour on its plantation cocoa farms 121 years ago. A documentary released in 2022 revealed that Cadbury pays cocoa farmers less than $3 a day, making hiring adult workers financially unfeasible. A shift from an independently verified certification (i.e., FairTrade) to an in-house certification named Cocoa Life, exacerbated these conditions.
The Senior Director of Cocoa Life believes that complete traceability only creates positive consumer stories and “redirects money away from farmers.” Cocoa Life documents the origin of the supply chain (i.e. from the farmer → to the cooperative → to the local exporter). The local exporter then proceeds to transport certified and uncertified beans together, instead of segregating them. Documentation conveniently ends at a point where systemic change is required, rendering the certification ineffective.
Cocoa Life does not even guarantee a minimum price to farmers, leaving them vulnerable to market fluctuations. They have asserted that increasing cocoa prices is a stopgap solution. This assertion coupled with their decision to await government intervention to increase cocoa prices to not disrupt national economic development plans paints a narrative of exploitation.
In truth, traceability empowers farmers, aids risk identification, and enables swift action. This is especially important as Mondelez mostly buys from small-scale farmers who are unorganized and thus do not possess significant bargaining power. To their credit, Mondelez has engaged a third-party company to assess the impact of their initiative on 10 Key Performance Indicators (KPIs). However, the company maintains control over what information is made public, creating barriers to transparency.
A brief look at the practices of 2 companies highlights the potential impact on millions of cocoa farmers and billions of chocolate consumers. Addressing the power asymmetry begets close proximity to farmers’ issues. Many confectionary companies have thus adopted a bottom-up management approach; For instance, Divine Chocolate in the UK is co-owned by farmer cooperatives. These practices ensure that the interests of the shareholders are balanced with that of the stakeholders. While the focus has traditionally been on Western Chocolate industries for buying unethically produced beans, Third World farmers, local governments and authorities remain central to addressing the unethicality in the cocoa trade.
Rashmika Sharma
