• About
  • Contact
  • Advertise
  • Awards
  • Classifieds
  • Login
  • Login
No Result
View All Result
Membership
Quota Media
Omnibuzz

Food systems news

Tuesday July 5 2022

Great minds think aloud

  • News
    • All
    • In the news
    • Features
    • Opinion
    Mr Justice Linden: “If it contains excess fat, sugar or salt, that product is adverse to a child's health"

    Kellogg’s loses court case over sugary cereal

    Farmer Andy Pimbley examining ripening strawberries inside a polytunnel at Claremont Farm in Bebington on the Wirral © Colin McPherson/FT

    Labour shortfall leading to ‘catastrophic’ food waste

    The Longview Power Plant, a coal-fired plant, stands on August 21, 2018 in Maidsville, West Virginia. The plant’s single unit generates 700 net megawatts of electricity from run-of-mine coal and natural gas. Spencer Platt | Getty Images

    US Supreme Court limits EPA authority

    “Understanding the emergence of CC398 in European livestock is vitally important for managing the risk it poses to public health”

    Super bug that arose in pigs can jump to humans

    Martin Lines, UK chair for the Nature Friendly Farming Network, says farmers will continue moving away from fertilisers and pesticides

    Fertilisers: going cold turkey in a time of crisis

    European Commission Vice-President Frans Timmermans, European Commissioner for Health and Food Safety Stella Kyriakides, and European Commissioner for the Environment Virginijus Sinkevicius

    EU to halve use of pesticides, heal nature

    trade deals

    WTO strikes global trade deals after ‘roller coaster’ talks

    inflation

    Food inflation is swallowing Latin America’s dietary staples

    Protestors outside UK Parliament with a placard reading, "Keep the protocol, keep the peace."

    New EU legal action over post-Brexit deal changes

    Buyers at Risk Countries in Africa and Asia are among the most reliant on Ukraine grain

    US quietly urges Russia fertiliser deals

  • Business
  • Policy
  • Research
  • Sections
    • All
    • Retail
    • Data
    • Society
    • Environment
    • Economy
    • Health
    • Food Safety
    • Governance
    • Security
    • Sustainability
    • Agriculture
    • Rights
    • Tech
    Mr Justice Linden: “If it contains excess fat, sugar or salt, that product is adverse to a child's health"

    Kellogg’s loses court case over sugary cereal

    Farmer Andy Pimbley examining ripening strawberries inside a polytunnel at Claremont Farm in Bebington on the Wirral © Colin McPherson/FT

    Labour shortfall leading to ‘catastrophic’ food waste

    The Longview Power Plant, a coal-fired plant, stands on August 21, 2018 in Maidsville, West Virginia. The plant’s single unit generates 700 net megawatts of electricity from run-of-mine coal and natural gas. Spencer Platt | Getty Images

    US Supreme Court limits EPA authority

    “If we lose territory we lose everything. It’s that simple.” Pic: Confederación de Nacionalidades Indígenas del Ecuador

    Ecuador’s Indigenous peoples: we are protecting our territories

    “Understanding the emergence of CC398 in European livestock is vitally important for managing the risk it poses to public health”

    Super bug that arose in pigs can jump to humans

    Martin Lines, UK chair for the Nature Friendly Farming Network, says farmers will continue moving away from fertilisers and pesticides

    Fertilisers: going cold turkey in a time of crisis

    European Commission Vice-President Frans Timmermans, European Commissioner for Health and Food Safety Stella Kyriakides, and European Commissioner for the Environment Virginijus Sinkevicius

    EU to halve use of pesticides, heal nature

    Executive director of Nourish Scotland, Pete Ritchie: “If the UK could just get over itself, alignment on sustainable food with the EU would be helpful”

    Scottish food bill: a dram to celebrate the end of the beginning

    trade deals

    WTO strikes global trade deals after ‘roller coaster’ talks

    Trending Tags

    • Covid-19
    • UK
    • Retail
  • Comms unit
  • Shop
  • Events
  • News
    • All
    • In the news
    • Features
    • Opinion
    Mr Justice Linden: “If it contains excess fat, sugar or salt, that product is adverse to a child's health"

    Kellogg’s loses court case over sugary cereal

    Farmer Andy Pimbley examining ripening strawberries inside a polytunnel at Claremont Farm in Bebington on the Wirral © Colin McPherson/FT

    Labour shortfall leading to ‘catastrophic’ food waste

    The Longview Power Plant, a coal-fired plant, stands on August 21, 2018 in Maidsville, West Virginia. The plant’s single unit generates 700 net megawatts of electricity from run-of-mine coal and natural gas. Spencer Platt | Getty Images

    US Supreme Court limits EPA authority

    “Understanding the emergence of CC398 in European livestock is vitally important for managing the risk it poses to public health”

    Super bug that arose in pigs can jump to humans

    Martin Lines, UK chair for the Nature Friendly Farming Network, says farmers will continue moving away from fertilisers and pesticides

    Fertilisers: going cold turkey in a time of crisis

    European Commission Vice-President Frans Timmermans, European Commissioner for Health and Food Safety Stella Kyriakides, and European Commissioner for the Environment Virginijus Sinkevicius

    EU to halve use of pesticides, heal nature

    trade deals

    WTO strikes global trade deals after ‘roller coaster’ talks

    inflation

    Food inflation is swallowing Latin America’s dietary staples

    Protestors outside UK Parliament with a placard reading, "Keep the protocol, keep the peace."

    New EU legal action over post-Brexit deal changes

    Buyers at Risk Countries in Africa and Asia are among the most reliant on Ukraine grain

    US quietly urges Russia fertiliser deals

  • Business
  • Policy
  • Research
  • Sections
    • All
    • Retail
    • Data
    • Society
    • Environment
    • Economy
    • Health
    • Food Safety
    • Governance
    • Security
    • Sustainability
    • Agriculture
    • Rights
    • Tech
    Mr Justice Linden: “If it contains excess fat, sugar or salt, that product is adverse to a child's health"

    Kellogg’s loses court case over sugary cereal

    Farmer Andy Pimbley examining ripening strawberries inside a polytunnel at Claremont Farm in Bebington on the Wirral © Colin McPherson/FT

    Labour shortfall leading to ‘catastrophic’ food waste

    The Longview Power Plant, a coal-fired plant, stands on August 21, 2018 in Maidsville, West Virginia. The plant’s single unit generates 700 net megawatts of electricity from run-of-mine coal and natural gas. Spencer Platt | Getty Images

    US Supreme Court limits EPA authority

    “If we lose territory we lose everything. It’s that simple.” Pic: Confederación de Nacionalidades Indígenas del Ecuador

    Ecuador’s Indigenous peoples: we are protecting our territories

    “Understanding the emergence of CC398 in European livestock is vitally important for managing the risk it poses to public health”

    Super bug that arose in pigs can jump to humans

    Martin Lines, UK chair for the Nature Friendly Farming Network, says farmers will continue moving away from fertilisers and pesticides

    Fertilisers: going cold turkey in a time of crisis

    European Commission Vice-President Frans Timmermans, European Commissioner for Health and Food Safety Stella Kyriakides, and European Commissioner for the Environment Virginijus Sinkevicius

    EU to halve use of pesticides, heal nature

    Executive director of Nourish Scotland, Pete Ritchie: “If the UK could just get over itself, alignment on sustainable food with the EU would be helpful”

    Scottish food bill: a dram to celebrate the end of the beginning

    trade deals

    WTO strikes global trade deals after ‘roller coaster’ talks

    Trending Tags

    • Covid-19
    • UK
    • Retail
  • Comms unit
  • Shop
  • Events
No Result
View All Result
Quota Media
No Result
View All Result
Home Topics Rights

Corporates: we’re not liable for failing to combat child labour

Cocoa giants say it would mean consumers and retailers who benefit from lower prices could also be held liable

by Lise Colyer
August 20, 2021
in Omnilabel, Business, Features, Governance
Reading Time: 4 mins read
0
Corporates: we’re not liable for failing to combat child labour

Pic: Miki Mistrati/The Dark Side of Chocolate

189
SHARES
2.1k
VIEWS
Share on TwitterShare on LinkedInShare on Facebook

The world’s largest cocoa companies have responded to a class action in the US alleging responsibility for the trafficking of Malian children to Ivory Coast for forced labour.

Human rights lawyer Terrence Collingsworth of IRAdvocates is behind the class action. He said the response demonstrates corporate self-monitoring is failing to protect children in this sector.

In video

  • Why do you believe corporate self-monitoring has failed?

The suit was filed in February against Nestlé, Cargill, Barry Callebaut, Mars, Olam, Hershey, and Mondelēz on behalf of all children trafficked from Mali to Ivory Coast between 2009 and February 2020 to work as forced labour on the plantations providing their cocoa.

The response from the companies says, the “defendants strongly condemn the use of forced labour. Moreover, they are also working to address the distinct issue of non-forced child labour in the cocoa supply chains…

“The plaintiffs’ theory would mean that any person purchasing products or materials produced in a particular country — including consumers and retailers who may “benefit” from lower prices — could be held liable based on trafficking carried out by unknown producers anywhere in that country…

“They promised to stop using child slaves”

“At bottom, the plaintiffs seek to hold the defendants liable because, although the defendants have engaged in decades-long efforts to help combat and mitigate child labour in Ivory Coast, those efforts have not succeeded…”

Terrence Collingsworth said, “The companies’ legal position conflicts with their own claims to consumers and regulators. They claim to have close relationships with their farmers and that they have been working directly with them to eradicate child labour.

“The companies’ shocking position in federal court directly confirms that they will do just about anything to keep profiting from enslaved children.”

Speaking recently at Quota’s UN pre-Food Systems Summit event, he said, “The reason I’m particularly outraged about the cocoa sector is that in 2001 after we did research showing truly horrible conditions of trafficked children, enslaved children, harvesting cocoa for giant corporations, America’s Congress passed a law that prohibited the importation of cocoa harvested by child slaves.

“The industry quickly mobilised, hired expensive lobbyists, and in the Senate they managed to convert that to the Harkin Engel protocol which is a voluntary initiative and which all the big cocoa companies signed in 2001.

“They promised to stop using child slaves. In the intervening 20 years they have given themselves four extensions of time. And now they’ve set their own goal that by the year 2025 they will reduce child labour by 70 per cent.

“You cannot let the fox guard the chicken coop”

“That’s what happens when you let corporations self-monitor, they continue to profit from whatever they are doing whether it is harming the environment or human rights. You cannot let the fox guard the chicken coop.”

This event was dedicated to addressing all human rights in agrifood, across the environment, land sovereignty and health as well as labour, through improved labelling.

The response to Terrence Collingsworth’s class action, filed jointly by the seven companies, says they are “US-based companies that are among the furthest downstream in the global cocoa supply chain.

“Cargill, Incorporated, Cargill Cocoa, and Olam International Americas, Inc. are cocoa suppliers that purchase cocoa beans from intermediaries, process them, and sell the processed cocoa to companies that use cocoa in their consumer products.

“Nestlé USA, Inc., Barry Callebaut USA, Mars, Incorporated, The Hershey Company, and Mondelēz International, Inc. are cocoa processors and food and beverage manufacturers that use cocoa purchased from various suppliers.

“In purchasing cocoa, the defendants are subject to Ivorian law… there is a minimum price, set by the national government, that farmers must be paid…”

Terrence Collingsworth said, “This obviously ignores that the companies are free to pay a higher price, a liveable wage price, but they apparently collude in jointly paying the minimum price.”

Speakers at a Quota event in April on the subject of child slavery in cocoa said that the big seven have the ability to influence the government of Ivory Coast to pay higher prices.

Sign up for Best of Quota
  Thank you for Signing Up
Please correct the marked field(s) below.
1,true,6,Contact Email,2 1,false,1,First Name,2 1,false,1,Last Name,2
Previous Post

Harmonised eco labelling is crucial to avoid confusion, says Nestlé

Next Post

Americans are moving to a region plagued by drought

Lise Colyer

Lise Colyer

Lise Colyer is a founding editor of Quota. She seeks to improve food systems by communicating effectively across the business, policy and research sectors. Contact LiseColyer@quota.media.

Next Post
Americans are moving to a region plagued by drought

Americans are moving to a region plagued by drought

Please login to join discussion

Editor's Picks

“If we lose territory we lose everything. It’s that simple.” Pic: Confederación de Nacionalidades Indígenas del Ecuador
Rights

Ecuador’s Indigenous peoples: we are protecting our territories

by May Davies
July 1, 2022
0
1.1k

Indigenous protestors in Ecuador remain wary, despite the agreement which has ended 18 days of strikes in which at least...

Read more
"At SCOOP we don’t demand exclusivity and actively encourage farmers to find new and better markets for themselves." Pic: Cotswolds farmer by David George

Paying farmers 75p for each £1 consumers spend on their produce

May 23, 2022
2k
Signing ceremony of PAGES, in Brazil’s state with the highest poverty and food insecurity rates. Pic: IFAD/Tayna Abreu

Food security meets Amazon protection in new UN project

May 20, 2022
1.7k
Man holding his chin facing laptop

Companies urge convergence on climate reporting standards

May 20, 2022
1.6k
"People need time at point of sale to learn to eat in a way that protects the planet"

Shifting to care – the benefits of being the most inconvenient supermarket

May 2, 2022
1.4k
Twitter Youtube LinkedIn
  • About
  • Advertise
  • Awards
  • Contact
  • Shop
  • Classifieds
  • Events
  • Login

Popular Tags

Covid-19 United States United Kingdom Brexit United Nations 2021 Food Systems Summit European Union China Food and Agriculture Organization Food banks Meat Climate Change COP26 World Food Programme UK Nestle Food waste Farmers

Best of Quota

Our audience's free secret weapon, leaving others to ask, "What do they know, that I don't?"


Thank you for Signing Up
Please correct the marked field(s) below.
1,true,6,Contact Email,21,false,1,First Name,21,false,1,Last Name,2

© 2021 Quota Media Limited | All rights reserved | Registered Company Number 12581018      Online Web Fonts

Terms & Conditions      Privacy Policy      Ethical Policy      Cookie Policy     

No Result
View All Result
  • Home
  • News
  • Business
  • Policy
  • Research
  • Comms unit
  • Shop
  • Events
  • Membership subs
  • Awards
  • Contact
  • About

© 2021 Quota Media Limited | All rights reserved | Registered Company Number 12581018      Online Web Fonts

Terms & Conditions      Privacy Policy      Ethical Policy      Cookie Policy     

Welcome Back!

Login to your account below

Forgotten Password?

Retrieve your password

Please enter your username or email address to reset your password.

Log In