The Only Real Raw Chocolate Blog: THE DARK SIDE OF CHOCOLATE DOES NOT REFLECT TO OUR CHOCONAT CHOCOLATE AND YOURS?

vrijdag 3 februari 2012

THE DARK SIDE OF CHOCOLATE DOES NOT REFLECT TO OUR CHOCONAT CHOCOLATE AND YOURS?

Take time to watch this 45 minute film, it will shock you

Is the chocolate we eat produced with the use of child labor and trafficked children?The award winning Danish journalist Miki Mistrati decides to investigate the rumours.

His hunt for answers brings him to Mali in West Africa,where hidden footagereveals ilegal traffickingof small children to the cocoa fields in neighbouringIvory Coast.Kids as Young as seven years old work illigal in the plantations where they face a dangerous job cutting down the cocoa and carrying heavy loads.Some are victimes of trafficking and most of the kids are never paid.

The West African country of Ivory Coast is the world’s lagest producer of cocoa with more than 40 percent of the world’s production

Companies like Nestle, Barry Callebaut (also Dynamic Chocolates who produce under white label also for a big MLM healthy chocolate) and Mars signed the Cocoa Protocol in 2001 promising to work for a total eradication of child labour in the cocoa sector 2008.

Does your favourite chocolate have a bitter taste? (cnn link 2010)

Follow Miki Mistrati into the bush of Africa to expose; The Dark Side Of Chocolate

Also see recent Article from CNN 25-11-2011 click at this Logo

Stop the Traffik director Antonie Fountain talks about his group’s efforts and the 10 Campaign

U.S. Sen. Tom Harkin on the Harkin-Engel protocol 10 years later:

And this CNN Article 16-01-2012

Overview and facts

Globally the majority of child labourers come from the poorer sections of society. Social exclusion and discrimination, a result of poverty and ethnic and gender biases, are important factors that keep children out of school and force them to work.Ending poverty and increasing access to education are therefore crucial tools in the fight against ending child labour.

Children who work are subsequently subject to abuse, both physical and sexual, from their employers and often work under conditions that are both unhealthy and potentially fatal. This scenario cannot continue.

Why we should care?

“Our greatest natural resource is the minds of our children.” – Walt Disney

Because of their unique and vulnerable position, children are denied the basic working rights and wages given to adults.

Children are most often employed in the informal and unregulated sectors of the global economy, for example in agriculture, and as a result they find themselves easy targets for abuse, intimidation and sexual exploitation.

Improving access to education and attacking poverty head-on would go a long way to solving the challenges children face. We must help them in their struggle. Child labour is an issue is closely connected with poverty, education, the distribution of world resources, socio-economic structures and gender/fertility related issues.

Defining child labour Though definitions vary, child labour means work that is done by children under the age of 15 (14 in some developing countries) which restricts or damages a child’s physical, emotional, intellectual, social and/or spiritual growth.Sometimes, work does not harm children. Work may even help them to learn new skills or to develop a sense of responsibility.Most people agree that when we speak about child labour, we mean labour which is intolerable or harmful to children, or which denies them their right to fully develop, to play or to go to school.Child labour includes:• Work performed by children under the age of 15
• Long hours of work on a regular or full-time basis
• Abusive treatment by the employer
• No access, or poor access, to education• Globally, 218 million children are child labourers¹• 126 million of these children are engaged in hazardous work²
• 73 million working children are less than 10 years old³
• Every year, 22,000 children die in work-related accidents⁴
• The largest number of working children-122 million-are in the Asia-Pacific region⁵• The highest proportion of working children is in sub-Saharan Africa, where nearly one third of the children aged 14 and under (48 million children) are in the labour force⁶
• 8.4 million children are trapped in slavery, trafficking, debt bondage, prostitution, pornography and other illicit activities⁷The number of children involved in armed conflicts has increased to about 300,000 over the past decade.⁸Between 40 and 50 per cent of all forced labourers are chidren⁹
• 1.2 million of these children have been trafficked (bought and/or sold)¹⁰
Where do children work?¹¹
• Nearly 70% are in agriculture (rural children, especially girls, usually start working in this industry when they are very young, often between 5 and 7 years of age)
• 22% are in services, including wholesale and retail trade, restaurants and hotels, transport, personal services, etc
• 9% are in industry, including mining and quarrying, manufacturing and construction