End Slavery in your Community, Parish, Workplace.
Make Your Easter Chocolate Slavery Free!
All Brigidines, our associates and colleagues are urged to buy and eat only slavery-free chocolate this Easter. Let’s not buy Easter eggs and chocolate that might have been produced using child labour from West Africa. The Slavery-Free Easter Chocolate Campaign, a *coalition of social justice groups, is asking people to buy only chocolate that carries a label (FAIRTRADE, Rainforest Alliance and UTZ certified) showing that the cocoa beans used in the chocolate’s production has been sourced ethically, from farmers who engage in good labour practices.
The International Labor Rights Forum (ILRF) estimates that there are about 1.5 million children working in the cocoa sector in West Africa, many of whom have been enslaved, or forced to work in exploitative conditions. Buying slavery-free chocolate at Easter gave people the opportunity to take a stand against human trafficking and slavery. It is well known that some children, working in some of the cocoa farms in West Africa are trafficked. Many others work in dangerous conditions for little or no wages and cannot attend school.
We are in a position to affect change and show solidarity with children who cannot go to school and who cannot afford to buy or eat chocolate. While many supermarkets are selling slavery-free chocolate this Easter and great gains have been made in recent years, we can do better. We want to make all the chocolate in our supermarkets and stores slavery-free.
“The 2011 Brigidine Congregational Forum encouraged us all to examine our purchasing practices so that we are supportive of Fair Trade as a means of having a positive impact on the poorest and most vulnerable in our world.”