Cadbury says end cocoa crop slavery - Brief Article

Eurofood, April 26, 2001

British chocolate giant Cadbury has taken a firm stance against forced child labour and says it supports international efforts to stamp out child slavery on African cocoa plantations.

The Birmingham-based confectioner originally established by Quakers made its appeal after a ship suspected of carrying children to work in plantations as cheap labour was found with at least 43 children on board.

The MV Etrino had been at sea for over two weeks and an alert was raised by the government of Benin which claimed that it was carrying up to 250 children destined to work on a number of West African cocoa plantations.

PREVENTATIVE ACTION NEEDED AT WORLDWIDE LEVEL

Cadbury spokesman Richard Frost said: "What we need to do is support the efforts of those African governments which are trying to tackle this. This needs to be done on a worldwide level."

Frost said that Cadbury imports around 90% of its cocoa from Ghana, which is believed to be unaffected by the slave trade. However, he added that "this is not an issue confined to cocoa. We believe the same thing happens with rice, maize and coffee".