Bernie Sanders Photo | Kouadioyaokro Village 2008

[Donkees]

Last edited Sat May 7, 2016, 10:00 AM - Edit history (1)

US Congressman Elliot Engel (C) and US Senators Bernie Sanders (R) and Thomas Harkin (L) chat after being dressed as Bouale leaders by public notaries of the Kouadioyaokro village, 150 km from Abidjan, 09 November 2008. US Senators Tom Harkin and Bernie Sanders visit comes ahead of a July 2008 certification deadline to ensure cocoa heading to the United States -- the third largest importer of Ivorian cocoa -- has not been produced with child labour. (Photo ISSOUF SANOGO/AFP/Getty Images)



Dark Side of Chocolate

Monday, January 7, 2008
A delegation of American lawmakers is visiting cocoa plantations in Ivory Coast and Ghana this week to monitor child labor abuses. Senator Bernie Sanders said before departing for Africa that he hoped "to see to what degree indentured children are being used to manufacture products which come into this country as chocolate." One 2005 study said as many as 200,000 children worked in plantations in the Ivory Coast, according an Agence France-Presse report. "The issue of child labor and the fact that you have very young kids who are working horrendous hours and not going to schools is an international problem," Sanders told the Burlington weekly newspaper Seven Days, "and it's one that has concerned me for a number of years. So we'll take a look and see what's going on in the chocolate industry."

While most of the major cocoa exporters -- Cargill; Archer, Daniels, Midland & Nestle -- and manufacturers -- Mars and Hershey's -- haven't certified any of their cocoa as child-labor free, a third-party, independent monitoring group called TransFair USA has been able to certify that approximately 16,000 cocoa farms in Ghana and the Ivory Coast were free of the worst forms of child labor through the "Fair Trade Chocolate" movement. Through a certification process, cocoa farmers are guaranteed a living wage, farmers agree not to use indentured labor, and farms are organized into democratic cooperatives. Unfortunately, none of the major cocoa exporters, producers, or manufacturers has agreed to participate in the Fair Trade Chocolate movement, so less than 1 percent of the chocolate consumed in the world is Fair Trade Chocolate.

http://www.sanders.senate.gov/newsroom/press-releases/dark-side-of-chocolate

[bahrbearian]

1. Clinton's right he's not a real democrat he has an [R] next to his name.

I'm told he was born in Socialist Cuba

[headonshoulder]

2. Then she will have to claim Harkin's a Liberterian

and Engel a Constitutionalist.

[thereismore]

3. Somebody alert the Hill trudge brigade! This proves Sanders is un-american! nt

[ljm2002]

4. The first thing I noticed...

...is that Bernie's wrap actually coordinates with his shirt, with narrow gray and white stripes as part of its design.

Probably because I have made quilts. Or maybe I'm just shallow...

[Donkees]

6. I noticed that too, and made more obvious by Mr. Stripes and Checks :)

[jillan]

5. He has been fighting for what is right his entire life. I'm so glad he ran for President because

I always knew he was a true progressive, but I never knew he was such a good person.
My respect for him continues to grow.

Senator Bernie Sanders said before departing for Africa that he hoped "to see to what degree indentured children are being used to manufacture products which come into this country as chocolate." One 2005 study said as many as 200,000 children worked in plantations in the Ivory Coast, according an Agence France-Presse report. "The issue of child labor and the fact that you have very young kids who are working horrendous hours and not going to schools is an international problem,

Thank you Bernie!