Lets create some 'intelligent' fuel for the fair trade fire...

I think to understand ‘Fair Trade’ and what Freedom Day is promoting, we first have to understand the cocoa trade in its context and entirety so that we know what we are saying is fair or unfair and who we need to target in response to the injustice of child slavery.

As has already been highlighted, the issue of bonded labour and slavery on the cocoa farms is a complex one simply because there are so many factors and actors implicated in the $31 Billion a year chocolate industry. It is not a simple case of the manufacturers exploiting farmers and child slaves. As Mike mentioned, there are middle men, an international market and a range of historical, cultural and economic reasons why the situation has got to this. It is not just about demonising Nestle simply because that is something people will understand. But don’t get me wrong, I’m not saying to let the 'billion dollar profits' a year producers off the hook because at the moment solutions are out there that would go a long way to change the situation, and have only been addressed by these companies through lip service.

Because of the complexity and size of the issue, we have debates such as this raging about what the appropriate responses from the industry, and ourselves as consumers of that industry, are. Is it the chocolate producers responsibility to monitor farm level labour practices and therefore them that we need to boycott until they do? Is it the Ivory Coast government's responsibility to ensure trafficking and labour laws are established and enforced? That traffickers are persecuted and stopped, that child slaves are released? Or should the response be legislation in developed countries that forces companies to put ‘made by slaves’ on the labels of products and leave it to consumer choice to fix the problem in the market?

I personally think all of the above sound great. Social Justice will only be achieved when we have a legal system that protects people, a society that views all humans as equals in the eyes of God and each person is given equal opportunity. The complexity of the differing interests in the industry make finding an effective simple solution a challenging task.

This issue actually exposes a lot about the current world system we live in and the processes that lead to exploitation. I don’t believe this issue is simply about Nestle or Cadbury being evil but a much broader understanding of what is going on in the world. The more I learn about the context of Jesus’s ministry, the more I see how well he understood the root causes of the social problems, and how the political powers were implicated.

So lets take the challenge of Mike’s and lets try and understand the injustice. I don’t believe reading just the fair trade brochures is enough, because they point to the problem without giving enough context for us to engage in 'intelligent' debates with the actors involved. So lets take a look:

Part 1: Push and Pull factors of Traffiking in the Ivory Coast today
In attempting to understand trafficking, often push and pull factors are used. Lets nut a few of these out and understand the trafficking link to the Cocoa industry in the Ivory Coast:

Historical Factors: The sheer size of the Ivory Coast’s Cocoa Industry is a Pull factor for trafficked children
Cocoa first appeared in Cote d'Ivoire in 1880 on a plantation. Initially only the Europeans owned cocoa plantations there until World War I. As cocoa prices increased on the world market during this period, Africans themselves began to grow cocoa. By the latter part of the 1970's, cocoa supplanted coffee as the major commodity when a cocoa boom occurred as the government encouraged cultivation by offering various price incentives. This emphasis on cocoa production has been entrenched in the economy to the extent that many farmers are dependent on cocoa for their livelihood. Approximately 1/3 of the Ivorian economy is based on cocoa exports.

Low productivity and the volatility of the commodity market, resulting in low and unstable farm-gate prices also creates a vicious circle of lower investments, lower productivity, lack of competitiveness and dwindling incomes. This only perpetuates the problem of child slavery on farms.

Cultural Factors as a Push Factor
An important concept we need to distinguish here is confusing child slaves with children working on family farms. There is a difference. Children working on farms is a very common practise in developing countries. They start working at an early age and are seen to play a vital function in the daily survival of the household and family. That however is where child labour is a cultural variable that contributes to the problem. Unlike in the west, where we might think it unimaginable to send our children away to work, this in many places is an acceptable and cultural practice. What we are talking about here however, are the children who trafficked under false pretences.

Poverty as Push Factor
Although some children come from Burkina Faso, Ghana, and Togo, most of the estimated 15,000 trafficked children, or child slaves, come from Mali. Since Mali is one of the poorest countries in the world, people travel to Ivory Coast to find jobs. It has become a destination of promised hope. Families send their children away thinking they are sending them to better job opportunities. If people are able to secure work, then they could send money back home to help their families for daily subsistence. Therefore, families allow their children to go away with people who turn out to be slave traders and are unaware of the reality of the situation.

(http://www.american.edu/ted/chocolate-slave.htm)