Fairtrade Cocoa

[lionking]

Last night I watched a BBC documentary on ABC Australia's "Four Corners" program. It was about an issue I knew little about - the selling of very young children into slavery to harvest cocoa beans in Africa.

http://www.abc.net.au/4corners/content/2010/s2885745.htm

Cocoa beans are the basic ingredients of chocolate. They are one of the most heavily traded commodities in the world. In Europe, major chocolate makers have signed up to Fairtrade programs, claiming some of their products are made without abusive labour practices. Now the BBC's Paul Kenyon, posing as a cocoa bean buyer, puts those claims to the test, revealing that despite Fairtrade's best efforts unscrupulous cocoa suppliers still try and cheat the system.

The documentary reported that few chocolate bars displayed Fairtrade stickers, and that even those that do may well be sourcing their cocoa from non-Fairtrade farms.

My question is this. If I were to boycott all non-Fairtrade chocolate and urged everyone I know, including those on the forum, to do the same, would that do anything for the plight of these young slaves or would it result in their fate being even grimmer (if that's possible) as their bosses' income is reduced?

 

[Cavemonster]

My question is this. If I were to boycott all non-Fairtrade chocolate and urged everyone I know, including those on the forum, to do the same, would that do anything for the plight of these young slaves or would it result in their fate being even grimmer (if that's possible) as their bosses' income is reduced?

I guess the ideal vision would be that if the non-fairtrade market shrunk considerably, it would lose some of the benefits of scale, making the fairtrade label, which commands higher unit prices, more attractive to producers.

Again, ideally, once the math worked out so that there was a large enough market for fairtrade to make it more profitable than slave labor, cocoa producers would profit from the switch.

For some random numbers out of my ass, say they get $10 a pound for raw cocoa, spend a buck of that on feeding, housing and aquiring slaves, and there was a market for 1000 pounds a month. That's a profit of $9,000/month. Fairtrade cocoa fetches $25 a pound, but getting up to fairtrade standards costs an extra $8 per pound produced, and currently there is only demand for 400 lbs a month of fairtrade cocoa. Meaning the profitability is $6800/month.

Obviously these bear little resemblance to actual numbers, but the main thing is that as a consumer, your input on profitability of these models, and thus which are more likely to be practiced comes from changing the demand, increasing the amount of fairtrade that can be sold and decreasing the market for non-fairtrade.

Where this falls down.
1) Cocoa is a gigantic market and the number of people who give a crap is comparatively tiny.

2) There is a huge incentive to cheat the system to get the fairtrade label without giving up the ugly labor practices. The ability to police these standards is low.

 

[Sir Robin Goodfellow]

I hadn't heard of this. I wonder where the companies over here buy their cocoa beans from? I assumed from Central and South America. But maybe things aren't much better there.

 

[Sir Robin Goodfellow]

Mars Canada doesn't mention anything on their website about fair trading practices, even though they mention other positive things they do. I'd pay a little more for a chocolate bar if it meant sticking it to slavers.

 

[The Central Scrutinizer]

The whole "fairtrade" thing, whether cocoa, coffee or otherwise, is just a way for stupid neo-hippies to feel good about themselves.

 

[Sir Robin Goodfellow]

Maybe. I haven't given it much thought. Most of the things I buy are made in Canada/United States. I'd rather not support slavery if I have an option.

 

[kerikiwi]

The whole "fairtrade" thing, whether cocoa, coffee or otherwise, is just a way for stupid neo-hippies to feel good about themselves.

How do you think it could be improved?
Or do you mean such things as slavery or child labour should not be opposed?
Stupid neo-hippies have just as much right to feel good about themselves as intelligent non-hippies.

 

[Cavemonster]

The whole "fairtrade" thing, whether cocoa, coffee or otherwise, is just a way for stupid neo-hippies to feel good about themselves.

By supporting producers who offer humane treatment to their workers and shunning producers who use slave labor.

How dare they feel good for supporting such a thing!

 

[Cain]

The only fair trade is quality vs. price; you cannot evaluate cost-inputs, and that's not your role as a rationally self-maximizing consumer; so why bother trying to impose morality on an amoral system? Get what you can at the best price you can, and make mine a double.

 

[kerikiwi]

The only fair trade is quality vs. price; you cannot evaluate cost-inputs, and that's not your role as a rationally self-maximizing consumer; so why bother trying to impose morality on an amoral system? Get what you can at the best price you can, and make mine a double.

Not my role? My role is whatever I want it to be.
And yes, one can exercise morality in an amoral system.

 

[lionking]

The whole "fairtrade" thing, whether cocoa, coffee or otherwise, is just a way for stupid neo-hippies to feel good about themselves.

First time I have ever been described as a neo-hippie. Anyone who reads my posts in Politics knows that I am as far from a green crusader as anyone could be.

I think, as kerikiwi says, that the market does have the capacity to change the employment practices of countries like Ghana. I'll only buy Fairtrade branded chocolate in future.

 

[lionking]

The only fair trade is quality vs. price; you cannot evaluate cost-inputs, and that's not your role as a rationally self-maximizing consumer; so why bother trying to impose morality on an amoral system?

Pretty rich from the occupier of the moral highground in the recent meat-eating thread.

 

[Merko]

The whole "fairtrade" thing, whether cocoa, coffee or otherwise, is just a way for stupid neo-hippies to feel good about themselves.

The whole 'fairtrade-bashing' thing is just a way for stupid ignorant egotists to feel good about themselves while enjoying their privileged lifestyle.

Fair trade does not solve all problems and it does introduce a few, but it gives some farmers better pay, meaning their kids can get some education perhaps, and sowing the seeds of a growing middle class in poor countries. It stimulates entrepreneurship and pioneers methods and practices for a more equitable system.

 

[Cain]

Pretty rich from the occupier of the moral highground in the recent meat-eating thread.

I'm all about devil's food.

Not my role? My role is whatever I want it to be.
And yes, one can exercise morality in an amoral system.

You can, but why bother? What makes capitalism wonderful is that people trade for mutual advantage, bracketing out ethnic origin, political ideology and other such nonsense.

Or as Adam Smith famously wrote: It is not from the benevolence of the butcher, the brewer, or the baker, that we expect our dinner, but from their regard to their own interest. We address ourselves, not to their humanity but to their self-love, and never talk to them of our necessities but of their advantages.

The best thing for everyone involved is to forget where their chocolate comes from. It's taking away time you could spend making money -- creating wealth -- which, like an invisible hand, uplifts us all.

 

[lionking]

The best thing for everyone involved is to forget where their chocolate comes from. It's taking away time you could spend making money -- creating wealth -- which, like an invisible hand, uplifts us all.

Including the slave-owners of Ghana?

 

[DC]

The whole "fairtrade" thing, whether cocoa, coffee or otherwise, is just a way for stupid neo-hippies to feel good about themselves.

i buy only fairtrade bananas. and yes it somehow does make me feel good, because i know those that had the work with it get payd better than usual and on the plantage they build a school for the kids. so the kids are learning instead of working for my luxury.

it makes both side feel good.

i dont understand your point. what is wrong with feeling good when you helped someone?

but i dont do it because it makes me feel better, i do it because i do belive it to be the right thing.

 

[DC]

thanks for posting it, very good, should be a major point here in switzerland, but it isnt.

 

[Cain]

The Food PO-leese are coming.

Including the slave-owners of Ghana?

Geez, the moral high-ground's getting mighty crowded these days. I'm supposed to feel guilty about the car I drive, the size of my television, air-conditioning, and now my Count Chocula. I want ONE person to tell me he or she doesn't smile at the mere mention of Count Chocula. You can't do it.

Anyway, to answer your question: who cares?

 

[DC]

Geez, the moral high-ground's getting mighty crowded these days. I'm supposed to feel guilty about the car I drive, the size of my television, air-conditioning, and now my Count Chocula. I want ONE person to tell me he or she doesn't smile at the mere mention of Count Chocula. You can't do it.

Anyway, to answer your question: who cares?

when you have no problems with poor people and kids beeing underpaid for their hard work, well yes then you dont have to feel guilty.

 

[lionking]

Anyway, to answer your question: who cares?

My dad used to say "never get into an argument with an idiot because they will drag you down to their level and beat you on experience".

That naturally, doesn't apply to you. I just had a compulsion to post it.