Please Stop Buying Chocolate

I've taken a break from blogging, not really intentionally, just life has been busy.

Today however I heard a message from Steve Chalk on human trafficking and was moved to fire off a quick post.

The basic gist is that a lot of chocolate today comes from the Ivory Coast, Africa, and that the great majority of their chocolate is produced by child slaves. Yes, that's right, slaves.

Just type in "chocolate slavery" into Youtube and you'll see what I mean.

Here's a few vids to get you going:







The basic ethical rule is: if you don't know for sure that the chocolate you're buying is slave-free or fair-trade, simple don't buy it. What's more important, your chocolate fix or the blood of innocent children on your chocolate-smeared hands? For UK consumers, a list of slave-free chocolate can be found here.

For more info, go to Stop The Traffik's Chocolate Campaign.

UPDATE 3rd oct: After emailing Edinburgh's Coco chocolate store, they have confirmed that although their supplier of organic chocolate is not officially in the Fairtrade programme, they told me: "The company who supplies us and their parent company have a firm anti-slavery stance and also work with small co-operative farms to ensure a fair price for the cocoa.". Excellent, as this is one of Edinburgh's best choccy shops!