Happy Halloween: Beware These 10 Popular Chocolate Brands that Exploit Child Slaves

Mars is not as good as it used to be, but Hershey's seems to me to be better than it ever was. Can't stop eating Reese's Peanut Butter Cups...

But I didn't know about the child labor treatment described in your OP. One question, if everyone stopped buying these candies, what will the users of child labor do next? Sell the kids? We have a lot to do with making the world safer for kids, our own too...

Will not buy candy for Halloween the way I have done in past years. I used to buy chewing gum, chips or some other treat and will try to keep your op in mind....

Maybe writing to Hershey's which is the one I buy most and ask them to look into this matter, they will demand a better life for these kids. It'll mean raising the price by a penny or two . . .

They're already having poor sales, people can't afford to shut the kids up in the supermarket by buying them candy bars any more.

That list seems to include everyone.

...but I don't know how much market penetration they might have. I love to buy their chocolates at Easter time.

Be warned, some people really really hate Zachary's and some like me really really like it. It might be one of those things where it's too 'poor' for some people's tastes, not sure.

produced by someone. I looked at their web site and they simply spoke of using "real chocolate" -- as a comparison, here is what Lake Champlain chocolates out of Burlington says about their FAIR TRADE chocolates -- and it seems that it was not easy for them to do this.
http://www.lakechamplainchocolates.com/about-us/fair-trade-chocolate/ I would bet that Zachary's is buying its chocolate from some producer -- and given that they ARE NOT making the point that they sought out fair trade chocolate - they likely didn't.

Obviously the down side is they cost a lot more ... but that is the consequence of not buying chocolate grown or harvested with slave labor and buying other high quality ingredients. In some ways, this shows the dilemma that many face - not juts on chocolate that is not really a necessity - though it seems to be! Very affordable food and clothes are often at the expense of good jobs for the producers. Yet, for many, it is what they can afford --- as they too were impacted by the downward spiral of incomes. This is why I almost hesitated to post the Lake Champlain chocolates info -- they are a luxury product.

http://www.foodispower.org/chocolate-list/

http://www.foodispower.org/chocolate-list/

They're vertically integrated, so they are better than Nestle or Hershey, but Ghirardelli/Lindt also uses child labor.

I'm shocked Green and Black was on the worst list.

Good resource. Thanks.

That's not the only reason why, but it does bother me that this is still going on after all the calls YEARS ago for those major brands to make a change. They SAID they would, but I saw a documentary on how those beans get distributed and basically it's done in such a way that all the companies can have plausible deniability that THEIR chocolate comes from that, but they ALL know that it does actually go on. Sickening.

For more than one reason.

NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!

I guess that I am going to have to enter some type of 12 step chocolate addiction program. It's not a complete loss because it looks like there are a lot of other companies that source their cocoa beans responsibly.

Similar to Ghiradelli's in SF, but better IMO. This will hurt because I usually send my mother a large box of See's milk chocolate nuts and chews for special occasions.

My husband would go to one of the stores and buy a small box for me every couple of weeks since we moved here a couple of years ago. Oh well, the farmers wouldn't feel so empowered to continue their practice of using exploited child labor if these companies hadn't either looked the other way, or encouraged their practices by continuing to purchase from them knowing how the cocoa was harvested.

How are people supposed to avoid it, then??

Theo, Equal Exchange, Green & Black, to name a few

Go to the organic section of your grocery store or a place like Whole Foods to find it.

It's so expensive, most people won't be able to buy a bar for each child. I am giving popcorn

The article has minimal info and I never buy candy so can't avoid it to make a statement.


The internet is so full of less than stellar articles it boggles the mind.

slave labour is involved, while if the cocoa is sourced from Latin America, there's very little chance.

if parents don't know me and don't trust my organic popcorn is fine, then OK, no popcorn for their kids. Commercial candy is death, not just to cocoa bean gatherers but also to buyers who eat it. It's mostly sugar. I like Theo's organic dark choc and you can eat quite a bit with no sugar shakes b/c there's hardly any sugar.

They are my two favorites.

K&R

This is sad to read about. I am surprised about See's Candies because I thought they were a good company.

k&r!

I just went out and bought Hersey's chocolates and Snickers. Wish I'd read this first!