Across the board I have to agree with what Siel says.

But I’m mostly writing to respectfully challenge Cybele’s 2nd comment, namely “Huge conglomerates can often make bigger differences in commodities like cocoa – where they’re investing millions of dollars in education, research and preserving biodiversity of the cacao simply because it’s a good long-term strategy. Smaller cooperatives simply can’t do that.”

Yes – the larger the firm, the bigger a difference they could theoretically make in the lives of cocoa farmers and children – if they choose to, and mostly they choose not to.

Conversely, so long as retailers and consumers appear satisfied with the large brands’ token efforts then it’ll always be the case that only the Krafts and Nestle’s will have the “millions” to dole out by the thimble-full. Meanwhile the smaller firms that are making a sincere effort will have do what they can with their much smaller sales volume.

Why I label the investments by Kraft et al as tokenism: the US Dept of Labor-funded study of the efforts of the ENTIRE global cocoa industry to combat forced child labor in West Africa determined that they had indeed “spent millions”, but only a mere 5 million over a full 9 years, in West Africa†. And my impression is that collectively the industry trade associations and members collectively put out about one press release for every $10,000 chunk of it – hence persuading conscientious observers like Cybele that some serious work was indeed being done. But, speaking seriously, these firms probably spent more on copy paper during that span. Measured at wholesale the global cocoa trade pulls in about $30 billion a year, or lets conservatively say $250 billion during the 9 years where they spent $5 million ‘doing everything possible’ to combat child labor. (fyi – that is .002% of revenue) . Not surprisingly, the $5 million did go very far. According to the study those efforts reached only about 3% of the relevant communities in the Ivory Coast & Ghana.
(† http://tinyurl.com/4mozpoj )

(I know there are other issues besides child labor, but that one is pretty indicative of how the industry approaches anything other that doesn’t involve boosting yields – an effort that ultimately benefits them directly and farming communities little.)

I’m guess I’m saying that the large firms have had many opportunities to do the right thing, even in small increments, and with the exception of Cadbury’s Fair Trade move w/Dairy Milk and now with Green & Blacks they have consistently done the wrong thing. This includes being cozy with both the corrupt Ivorian gov’t and the Ivorian rebel groups*; price-fixing schemes; efforts to dilute the definition of chocolate (well covered by Cybele actually); and more.
(*http://tinyurl.com/4stebf3 )

Meanwhile it has been the small firms like ourselves (Equal Exchange), Camino in Canada, Divine (UK / US), Alter-Eco (France), Ethiquable (France) and Altermercato (Italy) , and the scrappy/persistent ngo’s like Global Exchange, ILRF, and Global Witness who have both demonstrated the viability of truly ethical/sustainable chocolate and have shamed the large firms for their chronic foot-dragging and tokenism.

It’s interesting, b/c I’ve kept a list of places where you can get fair trade chocolate in L.A. (link in post) since near the beginning of this blog — and if you look at it right now, the list still isn’t large. Once G&B makes the 100% switch, most places that sells chocos will have fair trade chocolate — thereby suddenly making my list unnecessary / obsolete. Even while I’m more likely to go out of my way buy from Theo’s or Equal Exchange, I am glad that choco lovers will have a fair trade option pretty much everywhere they shop.

I think that pulling out single products or brands of a huge company is like someone looking a single action of yours and saying that it makes you a bad environmentalist or examining a single blog post and saying that it makes you a bad writer.

I have no dog in this fight. I enjoy some of Green & Black’s products and I hope that a global company like Cadbury can bring about real change for West Africa, where they need fair trade more than South & Central America for the cacao practices. (I mean in reference to use of child labor, slavery and use of pesticides, not necessarily fair wages and sustainable planting.) Because it’s not going to happen without them … when the emerging markets like China and India open their hearts and pocketbooks to chocolate, it will mean either great things or terrible things for Africa, and this is the time to get on the road to the great things.

In fact, Sierra Club as a campaign against Kraft’s widespread use of milk products from rBGH-treated cows. The plain truth is that Kraft is one of the worst “food” companies out there — which is why when they buy out companies like G&B, fans of those products get upset/confused.

While I think companies have at least as much responsibility as consumers for what’s on the supermarket shelves, I agree that if no one bought Kraft products (or perhaps none but G&B and maybe Planters Peanuts if they come out with an organic version :P ) Kraft wouldn’t exist — which is why blog posts like this discuss how to make better consumer decisions.

People buy the non-food products and that’s why they make them. If no one bought them, they wouldn’t keep making them. Consumers bear the brunt of responsibility for the food that is made and sold.

And yes, people were quite up in arms about Cadbury buying Green & Black’s. On the whole, I’m inclined to think it helped Cadbury figure out how to go fair trade with the Dairy Milk bars. The opposite example of a big company buying a “responsible” small company would be Hershey’s buying Dagoba.

Your comment — “Kraft at least makes food” — seriously made me LOL. Since when is guacamole made with less than 2% avocado food? At best, Kraft makes what Michael Pollan calls edible food-like substances –

The focus for cacao should probably be on the lower-tiers of cocoa, the stuff that’s not good enough to be made into eating chocolate, that’s sold at a loss by the plantations that grow it, further perpetuating the poverty of that area.

You might find The Eco-Shopper’s Dilemma (linked to above) interesting to read; a number of environmentalists weigh in about their personal feelings about the consumer choices they can make.

I’m a little unclear about the goals of boycotting companies like Kraft. Isn’t it better, if you’re going to buy from them, to buy the most socially & ecologically responsible products they make, sending them the message that it’s where you want them to take the company?

Or is anything big & multinational to be avoided?