Cocoa farmers’ voice in the chocolate industry is rising, says the World Cocoa Farmers Organization (WCFO), but a Declaration from farmers urges greater involvement in decision making on industry and government policy.
Rainforest Alliance says its SAT4Farming, a satellite technology that was recently adopted by 1,000 cocoa farmers in Ghana, could potentially provide ‘cheaper and more reliable’ sustainability certifications to chocolate companies.
Cargill says its licensed buying company (LBC) model has helped double sustainably sourced cocoa in Ghana during the 2017/2018 crop season to 10,000 MT, and it will extend the program to four more districts moving forward, including Debiso A, Debiso B,...
A raft of promises and reports were published on this year’s World Day Against Child Labor, highlighting the extent of forced labor in the cocoa industry with calls for greater transparency to help solve the problem.
The International Cocoa Initiative (ICI) has identified 14,986 child labor cases on the cocoa farms in Côte d’Ivoire and Ghana since 2012, but warned the reality could be a lot worse.
The Rainforest Alliance has issued science-based training materials customized for the specific cocoa-growing regions in Ghana since degrees to which those regions are affected by climate change vary.
The chocolate industry should support community-led buffer zones between tropical rainforest and cocoa farms to improve uneasy relations between farmers and their elephant neighbours, says a park manager in Ghana.
Mars Wrigley Confectionery aims to triple the global cocoa production volume in the next decade partly through developing better disease-resistant varieties, Frank Mars, member of the company's Board of Directors, recently said at the World Cocoa...
