February 2, 2022
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Rights Action supports this call, sent to us by Kathleen Ruff, for organizations to sign on a letter calling on U.S. Custom and Border Protection (Department of Homeland Security) to enforce laws to stop forced child labor in chocolate industry
- Below: BBC news article, 18 June 2021: “US Supreme Court blocks child slavery lawsuit against chocolate firms”
Overwhelming evidence shows that forced child labour is being widely used in the cocoa industry. The corporations involved - Cargill, Nestle, Hershey and others - pledged twenty years ago to end the use of forced child labour in their industry but have not done so - the use of child slave labor continues.
More than 800,000 children here are believed to do some form of cocoa-related work.
Photo: BBC news, November 10, 2011
These companies now argue in the US Supreme Court that they should be granted impunity for their massive and profitable use of forced labor in their supply chain.
US government regulations prohibit the import of goods into the US that use forced labor. The Customs and Border Control Commission enforces this law. But two years after receiving clear evidence of widespread use of forced child labour in the cocoa industry, they have not taken action. Cargill, Nestle, etc. are lobbying hard for the US government to turn a blind eye to their use of forced child labour.
Please add your support to the letter (link below) calling on the new Commissioner of the Customs and Border Control Commission to take action.
Email your organizational endorsement
to Kathleen Ruff, [email protected]
by February 8, 2022
Organizations: Please give name of organization, country or region, and name of a representative.
Scientists, academics, public health professionals and human rights advocates: Please give name, qualifications, titles, past and present (for identification purposes only), and country.
More information
Kathleen Ruff, partner, International Rights Advocates; Honorary Fellow, Collegium Ramazzini
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Organizational sign-on letter
calling on U.S. Custom and Border Protection (Department of Homeland Security) to enforce laws to stop forced child labor in chocolate industry
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US Supreme Court blocks child slavery lawsuit against chocolate firms
18 June 2021, BBC news, https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-57522186
It's estimated that 1.56m children work in the cocoa industry in Ghana and Ivory Coast.
The US Supreme Court has ruled food giants Nestlé USA and Cargill can't be sued for child slavery on African farms from where they buy their cocoa.
Six African men alleged that they were trafficked from Mali and forced to work on cocoa farms in Ivory Coast. The group say both companies perpetuated that slave trade to keep cocoa prices low.
The court ruled 8-1 that the group had no standing because the abuse happened outside the US.
But it stopped short of a definitive ruling on whether the Alien Tort Act - an 18th century law - could be used to hold US companies to account for labour abuses committed in their supply chains abroad.
About 70% of the world's cocoa is produced in West Africa, and much of this is exported to America. It's estimated that 1.56m children work on cocoa farms in Ivory Coast and Ghana, according to a report published by the US Department of Labor last year.
In their lawsuit, the group of men alleged that they were forced to work on the cocoa farms for 12-14 hours a day. They also said they were kept under armed guard while they slept, in order to prevent them from escaping, and were paid little beyond basic food.
While decrying child slavery, the companies argued the case should instead be made against the traffickers and the farmers who kept them in such conditions.
In its decision, written by Justice Clarence Thomas, the court ruled that while Nestlé USA and Cargill provided the farms with technical and financial resources, there was no evidence that business decisions made in the US led to the men's forced labour.
To activists who have fought chocolate firms for years, the ruling came as a blow. "They decided on the budgets, they decided on the planning, on the business aspects - all those things were done from the US," said Terry Collingsworth, executive director of International Rights Advocates, speaking to Fortune Magazine.
Mr Collingsworth said his legal team would file a new lawsuit, alleging that many decisions made by Nestlé and Cargill in the US helped to pave the way for the use of child slaves in Ivory Coast.
In a statement, Nestlé USA said it had never engaged in child labour and remained "unwavering in [its] dedication to combating child labour in the cocoa industry".
Background article
“Ivory Coast cocoa farms child labour: Little change”
By Humphrey Hawksley, BBC News, 10 November 2011
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-africa-15681986
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Hudbay Minerals lawsuits
As the U.S. Supreme Court, in its cocoa (chocolate) industry ruling, reinforces the impunity and immunity from civil or criminal law liability for U.S. companies, the landmark Hudbay lawsuits continue in Canadian civil courts, trying to hold the Canadian company to account for mining-linked repression at the company’s former mine site in Guatemala.
TESTIMONIO: Canadian Mining in the Aftermath of Genocides in Guatemala
Our recently published book addresses many of the very same issues in the Canadian-led mining industry in Guatemala, that this effort seeks to address in the chocolate (cocoa) industry to achieve some minimal, binding accountability for their exploitative, violent actions in places like Ivory Coast.
Tax-Deductible Donations (Canada & U.S.)
To support land and environment, human rights and justice defenders in Honduras and Guatemala – including the community defenders profiled in TESTIMONIO - make check to "Rights Action" and mail to:
- U.S.: Box 50887, Washington DC, 20091-0887
- Canada: (Box 552) 351 Queen St. E, Toronto ON, M5A-1T8
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