Scarfing down chocolate does more than widen your waistline: it also supports the use of child slavery in the cocoa industry. In the Ivory Coast, the world's leading producers of cocoa, farmers have recently faced plummeting prices due to overproduction and market deregulation. In response, some farmers have chosen to cut costs by using forced, unpaid labor.
Young men and boys from Mali, who typically contract with farmers for the season, and suddenly denied their pay once the crop is sold. Others are lured to the plantations with promises of high pay, only to become trapped there as slaves. Owners use beatings and threats of folk spells to exercise control over their slaves.
Victor, a young boy who escaped from slavery on a cocoa plantation, had never tasted chocolate. When asked what he would say to those who buy the chocolate that he helped produce, he replied: "They buy something I suffer to make. They are eating my flesh."
Click here to view a list of "slavery-safe" chocolate makers.