Tony’s Chocolonely, the Netherlands-based firm making confectionery from ethically-sourced cocoa, has responded to the company’s removal from the Slave Free Chocolate list because of its links to ingredients supplier Barry Callebaut.
Barry Callebaut is among seven confectionery and ingredients giants facing a lawsuit over alleged child labour infringements filed last Friday (12 February) by the Washington DC-based human rights organisation International Rights Advocates on behalf of eight former cocoa plantation workers in the west African country of Cote D’Ivoire, who claim they were forced to work without pay when they were still children.
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Described as “Malian young men” by Slave Free Chocolate, the organisation claimed they managed to escape back to Mali after being trafficked as children “and forced to harvest cocoa in Cote D’Ivoire for one or more of the defendant companies” – Nestlé, Cargill, Mars, Mondelez International, Hershey, Barry Callebaut, and Olam International.
Tony’s Chocolonely, which says it sources cocoa from seven cooperatives in Ghana and the Ivory Coast, is also part of the Fairtrade Foundation, an organisation promoting sustainable and equitable trade relationships around the world, and is also B-Corp certified, a validation of a companies environmental and sustainability commitments.
However, the company said in a reactionary statement that “Slavefreechocolate.org is not an official certification. When it comes to official certifications like Fairtrade and B-Corp, Tony’s passes with flying colours. Ultimately, all these organisations are working towards the same goal – to end human rights violations in the cocoa industry”.
It added: “We have never found a case of modern slavery in our supply chain. But we do find instances of illegal child labour occurring on the cocoa farms where we source our beans. We have always been 100% transparent about this. And fully clear that it is not acceptable. Which is why we actively look for instances of illegal child labour, so we can proactively solve them.
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By GlobalData“We use 100% traceable beans, so we know exactly which farms we are working with, and we have a Child Labour Monitoring and Remediation System (CLMRS) in place across all seven cocoa cooperatives that we source from in Ghana and Ivory Coast. Last year, we found 387 cases of illegal child labour and remediated 221.
“Most big chocolate companies do not know how many cases of illegal labour there are in their cocoa supply chain, so they cannot work to remediate them. But because we have a 100% traceable supply chain (as validated by PwC in our annual reports), we can take 100% accountability for eradicating the problem.
"We welcome any challenge and debate that helps to raise the bar in the chocolate industry and gets us closer to making 100% slave free the norm in chocolate."
Tony's Chocolonely, which was founded in 2005 by three Dutch journalists amid concerns cocoa was being sourced from plantations that used child labour and slavery, said it was removed from the Slave Free Chocolate list a "couple of months ago".
The company explained its relationship with Barry Callebaut.
"Some critics believe we shouldn't work with Barry Callebaut. But again, this decision is deliberate. Our mission is to make 100% slave free the norm in chocolate, not just our chocolate but all chocolate worldwide," it said.
"In 2005, we deliberately chose to partner with Barry Callebaut to show that it is possible to be fully traceable while working with a large processor. From the start, Barry Callebaut has believed in our mission and collaborated with us to set up fully segregated processing for our 100% traceable beans so they are never mixed with other beans.
"Working with Barry Callebaut allows us to further scale up our production and enables us to grow Tony's Open Chain by processing the 100% traceable cocoa beans from our mission allies, too."
