BEATRICE MOULIANITAKI, Head of Cocoa Sustainability
Submitted by The Hershey Company
Nearly 70 percent of the world’s cocoa comes from West Africa, and cocoa is a critical and often sole source of cash for millions of smallholder farming families. Unfortunately, these communities face environmental and economic difficulties that present various challenges for West African cocoa farmers. Many typically have low incomes, often at or below the accepted poverty line. Basic infrastructure is minimal or non-existent and land-rights are often poorly defined. Additionally, new cocoa production is frequently expanded by bringing additional land under cultivation rather than increasing crop yields on existing farmland.
Beyond that, severe economic pressure results in children often helping with cocoa activities on family farms, sometimes resulting in too long hours, heavy loads and lack of schooling.
We are committed to eradicating these practices and helping West African cocoa farming communities be sustainable and prosperous.
A Deep Commitment to Responsible Cocoa Sourcing and Driving Systemic Change
Hershey was built on making moments of goodness for people to enjoy – a philosophy and belief that extends across our entire operations and supply chain. This includes ensuring responsible, sustainable practices, from sourcing the ingredients through to how the products are made. That’s why we are deeply committed to creating a truly sustainable cocoa supply chain where:
Our Sustainable Cocoa Strategy – Cocoa For Good
To achieve these goals, we are focused on:
COCOA FOR GOOD
Through our sustainable cocoa strategy, we are:
Nourishing Children through providing nutritional supplements to school children and training community members on nutrition and crop diversification.
Empowering Youth by preventing child labor through awareness raising, investing in school infrastructure and management, providing birth certificates, as well as training for youth in business and life-skills; detecting and remediating instances of child labor through Child Labor Monitoring and Remediation System (CLMRS).
Helping Communities Prosper by paying a premium to farmers for cocoa meeting certification standards; participating in the governments’ Living Income Differential (LID) program; providing tailored farm development plans, training in business skills, providing financial services and setting up voluntary savings and loans systems; creating community action plans; and providing financing for development of cooperatives and community infrastructure such as water pumps, roads and bridges.
Preserving Ecosystems through satellite mapping of all farms to improve tracking of yields and productivity, ensure no encroachment of protected areas, and enable full traceability from farm to cooperative; providing high-quality cocoa seedlings and shade trees, as well as training on agroforestry; creating community-owned natural resource management plans and supporting access to affordable land-titling documentation.
A sneak peek into 2020 Results
Sustainability is serious business and throughout the last few years, we have made significant progress. I’d like to give you a heads-up on what we have been working on in 2020 that is at the forefront of our daily and strategic sourcing decisions:
Supporting Increased Farmer Incomes and Resilience
As we collectively navigate the challenges presented by COVID-19, we have seen that past investments in farmer groups, communities and social infrastructures such as Village Savings and Loans Associations, have paid off. But we have also seen how vulnerable the rural communities we work with still are. This has only strengthened our belief to continue with Cocoa For Good as a company, and motivates me and the Cocoa For Good team daily to bring goodness to our iconic chocolates.
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