The 10 Campaign coalition and Fairfood International work to end child and forced labour in the cocoa industry. Join our cause and help raise awareness by entering this photo contest. Grab some fair-trade chocolate, your camera, and some creative insights and show us what you’ve got! Join us and you might be the lucky winner of fair products worth €50,-. Update 22/2/2012: The competition has now closed. Thank you for voting!

Today, we are proud to announce the lucky winner, whose picture received a whopping 376 votes on the Bittersweet website. Ewa Tuteja’s photo “I was gone for just a minute…”, has won fair products worth €50,-. Congratulations, Ewa!
We’d like to thank everyone once again for all of your wonderful entries.

"I was gone for just a minute..."
Ewa (Germany)

Bittersweet has finished, leaving us exactly with that taste; we are pleased that so many of you support this cause; joining it with so much enthusiasm and helping us spread our message. However, child labour and slavery still continue to this day and there are still major commitments to be made to finally create a world free of cocoa produced at this expense.

Images courtesy of EverJean (CC License)

Ten years ago, in 2001, the global chocolate industry signed the Harkin-Engel Protocol through its various trade associations. This protocol is a 6-point roadmap that wanted to eliminate the worst forms of child labour in the cocoa sector of Côte d'Ivoire and in Ghana.

The Tulane University, mandated by the US government, began research in 2006 to report the progress of the protocol. One of the outcomes was that not one of the six points of the protocol calling for action was fully implemented.

This means that the required industry-wide reform in the cocoa sector did not take place. The university also documented that an estimated 1.8 million children are working, some in deplorable labour conditions, in the cocoa sector of Côte d'Ivoire and in Ghana.

Want to learn more about issues in the cocoa industry? Read our Product Page about Cocoa.

Fairfood International is a non-profit organisation passionate about facilitating change towards a sustainable food and beverage industry. Since 2002, the organisation has been engaging in positive dialogue with food and beverage brand owners worldwide with the hope of initiating genuine change.

Fairfood International believes that with their advocacy efforts and worldwide support, companies will move towards adopting fair means of production and trade. This way, we can be confident that in the future every meal will be a sustainable one.

To find out more about Fairfood International and ways in which you can support our cause, please go to www.fairfood.org.

The 10 Campaign is a joint initiative by the leading civil society organisations on cocoa throughout the world. 10 Campaign calls on companies and governments to take their responsibility, and, after 10 years of failed voluntary self-regulation, to implement laws to ensure that industry will finally deliver on the promises they have made.

To find out more about the 10 Campaign, please visit www.10campaign.com.

As a member of the 10 Campaign coalition, Fairfood International is encouraging the cocoa industry to move towards adopting fair means of production and trade. To learn more about Fairfood, visit www.fairfood.org.