[Corporations] Candy Maker Enables Child Slavery, Ministers Say

[Mike Ewall]

http://www.blackamericaweb.com/site.aspx/bawnews/candymaker

Candy Maker Enables Child Slavery, Ministers Say

Date: Wednesday, February 18, 2004
Author: NIA NGINA MEEKS

Hershey Foods Inc. has been anything but sweet toward African children 
slaving in cocoa fields overseas, a group of black ministers in Harrisburg, 
Pa., is charging.

About 40 churches led by the Rev. W. Braxton Cooley Sr., president of the 
Interdenominational Ministers Conference of Greater Harrisburg, have 
targeted Hershey as the local face of a nightmare that affects children in 
West Africa.

The lust for cocoa profits has driven many African adults to snatch and 
enslave African children to work in the fields alongside families that 
scrabble to earn less than pennies a day to support a global sweet tooth.

Though Hershey contends that it is working with a host of other corporate 
and governmental agencies to arrest the problem, these clergy don't believe 
that the 184-year-old confectioner is doing enough.

"We're talking about corporate responsibility," Brenda M. Alton, a member 
of the ministers' group told BlackAmericaWeb.com. "When we bite into that 
chocolate bar, we are biting into the flesh of our children."

The bulk of the world's cocoa beans are produced by four West African 
nations: Nigeria, Cameroon, Ghana and the Ivory Coast, with the latter 
supplying some 43 percent of the market.

Children are tasked with clearing fields, weeding, maintaining the trees 
and applying pesticides, among other duties. But the machetes used for 
clearing and the toxins meant to poison pests both prove hazardous for 
youngsters -- many of whom are under 14.

While a great deal of them work beside their parents, thousands of other 
children ages 9 to 12 routinely are snatched from their homes, sometimes 
from neighboring countries, and forced into labor, according to a 2002 
study issued by the International Institute of Tropical Agriculture. Media 
reports about the cocoa-bred slave trade among West African children began 
surfacing as early as 2001.

Hershey spokesman John C. Long said chocolate giants around the globe began 
conferring with labor organizations and others about how best to attack the 
problem in response to the outcry.

The industry is putting together a monitoring system, though it is unclear 
as to when pilot programs will be established. But there is a commitment to 
having all farms monitored for child labor abuses by July 2005, said Susan 
S. Smith, spokeswoman for the Washington, D.C.-based Chocolate 
Manufacturers Association and the National Confectioners Association.

"Hershey Foods has played a leadership role in efforts to ensure that cocoa 
is grown responsibly," said Long, "since reports of child labor in the 
Ivory Coast first appeared."

Earl Harris, a pastor at St. Paul Missionary Baptist Church in Harrisburg, 
dismissed Hershey's responses as "inadequate, sluggish and ineffective." He 
serves as 2nd vice president for the ministers' conference. "The slavery 
still goes on," said Harris. "How could we support an industry that is so 
callous that they use babies to make a profit?"

Global Exchange, a San Francisco-based social watchdog group, argues that 
fair trade standards would alleviate the slavery issue because poverty -- 
the root of the situation -- would be lessened.

Offering American subsidies, much like what farmers here and other places 
receive, would help farmers earn better wages and deter the slave trade, 
said spokeswoman Melissa Schweisguth.

It's an argument the ministers are echoing. They noted their chocolate 
boycott on Valentine's Day, arguing that sweet indulgences come at too high 
a price, and that others should follow suit.

The ministers gained support from the Southern Christian Leadership 
Conference, the National Baptist Convention, fraternities and others. These 
ministers are gearing for a spring meeting with members of the 
Congressional Black Caucus, in hopes of adding legislative muscle to their 
cause.

That's not to say though that the ministers represent a united front.

Both local branches of the NAACP and the Urban League declined to be 
involved. Ditto for the local African-American Chamber of Commerce.

That's because some say this battle is but an outgrowth of earlier 
disagreements such as minority hiring and procurement at the Harrisburg 
International Airport.

Hershey, as a Fortune 500 company and one of the largest employers in the 
area, could have exercised more pressure in those areas, too, the ministers 
have said.

"This issue did not start with West Africa," said Fredrick A. Clark, an 
area consultant who is black and works with Hershey Foods. "[The ministers] 
have other issues that are personal and not related to progressing the 
issue of all people of color."

The ministers disagree, saying that they have focused their efforts on one 
point, bringing light to a moral outrage.

"The picture being produced is that the matter is under control," Harris 
said. "They have chosen to ignore it."