Sustainable Initiatives
producing cocoa but are systematically overlooked and disadvantaged within the sector. Fairtrade’s Women’s School of Leadership, a programme run by Fairtrade Africa, aims to raise awareness about gender issues and support cooperatives to understand and integrate women more fully into their membership and decision-making. A key outcome from this training is that, through financial and entrepreneurship training, female cocoa farmers have been able to get together and form additional female-led side businesses, so they are not entirely reliant on cocoa for their income. The additional income has allowed the women to save money for themselves, pay for school fees and expand their business together. Finally, a survey from 2021 conducted
by the Impact Institute found that the average Fairtrade Ivorian cocoa farmer’s annual household income increased by 85% from 2016/7 to 2020/2021, driven in part by increased revenue from cocoa sales and diversification through in-kind and off-farm incomes. Fairtrade is clear that higher prices to cocoa farmers are key to transforming livelihoods.
In terms of policy and legislation, what key changes are needed to better support fair trade practices and address issues like deforestation and human rights violations in supply chains? The next government should deliver strong regulation to reduce the threats associated with irresponsible business practices and to create an environment in which ethical business can flourish. Over 30 years, our partners have committed to doing the right thing via the voluntary approach of Fairtrade certification. Effective regulation can drive sector-wide changes compelling other businesses to do the same and create the conditions for ethical business, at scale and at pace. But in designing and implementing new regulation, care must also be taken. If the development of legislation is to achieve its aims of curbing irresponsible business and protecting the vulnerable, it must also involve listening carefully to producers and addressing their needs in order to avoid unintended impacts on those at the end of supply chains. For instance, before the election was
announced, new legislation was expected to come before the UK Parliament to ban large businesses from importing certain
30 Kennedy’s Confection June 2024
commodities, including cocoa, into the UK sourced from illegally deforested land. Deforestation is a significant driver of the climate crisis and regulation to tackle it within supply chains is a powerful tool to support those at the frontline of climate change. It is also crucial that the design and implementation of legislation fully considers the needs of producers and doesn’t inadvertently create additional challenges for them. Otherwise, it risks the unintended consequence of pushing more people into poverty and will not have the effect of reducing deforestation as it sets out to do. In line with ensuring a just transition towards a more environmentally sustainable approach to trade, we are therefore asking the next government to move forward with deforestation legislation while ensuring that the burdens of complying with this legislation are not pushed down to the bottom of the supply chain. Achieving better traceability and transparency will come with significant costs and new demands across supply chains. Smallholders and their producer organisations will need to be properly consulted and provided with technical and financial support to meet these requirements and avoid being excluded from UK supply chains. New legislation should also be accompanied by measures working towards paying producers living incomes and encouraging businesses to commit to long-term contracts with suppliers.
What innovative approaches are Fairtrade- aligned businesses taking to enhance sustainability and fair trade practices within the confectionery and chocolate industries? ‘Shared Impact’ is a significant new Fairtrade business approach in cocoa, coffee and bananas that gives grocery retailers an opportunity to collaborate with others to create more focused impact for specific producer groups that are not otherwise able to sell high volumes of their overall production on Fairtrade terms. Further benefits of the scheme include the ability to provide greater supply chain transparency, risk management, targeted solutions to the challenges producers are facing, and the ability to be able to tell authentic stories to consumers. We are really excited by the attention, interest and discussions we’ve had with retailers who see Shared ImPact as a key part of their cocoa sustainability strategy.
Meanwhile ongoing category conversions
continue to drive impact for cocoa farmers, with retail Fairtrade sales volumes of cocoa products seeing 6% growth in 2023. Co-op converted 100% of their cocoa to Fairtrade in 2017 and have launched innovative products including the first own-label vegan Fairtrade chocolate bar. In 2021, Waitrose finalised their conversion to 100% Fairtrade cocoa across their entire confectionery range and Lidl rolled out their Way 2 Go chocolate across 400 stores, they are now the biggest retailer by volume of Fairtrade cocoa in the UK. Aldi brought out the Choco Changer, a chocolate bar focusing on supporting farmers towards living incomes. Greggs has switched to using only Fairtrade chocolate in its own products such as Milk Chocolate Cookies, Caramel Shortbread and Chocolate Brownies. 100 per cent Fairtrade brand Tony’s
Chocolonely launched in major retailers in 2021, since then, we celebrated a 100 per cent conversion to Fairtrade by Guylian. Last summer, Tony’s and Ben & Jerry’s came together in a new transformative partnership with a mission to end modern slavery in cocoa and provide leadership in the promotion of paying Fairtrade’s Living Income Reference Price for cocoa. We are also working with companies on bespoke partnerships which test new approaches to support cocoa farmers to achieve a living income. Our 3-way partnership with Mars and Ecookim (a
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