Dive Brief:
- An appeals court ruling will allow three men from Mali to bring a civil child slavery case against Nestle, Cargill, and Archer Daniels Midland.
- The case, to be heard in California, alleges that the three companies aided and abetted the luring of the three men, then children, across the border from Mali to Africa's Ivory Coast in the 1990s. There, they were put to work with no pay on cocoa farms.
- Of course, the companies involved are denying any involvement, though the complexity of the supply chains does make it possible that they were unaware.
Dive Insight:
Ultimately, this case hangs on whether the three men involved, represented by NGO Global Exchange, can prove that Nestle, Cargill, and ADM had "specific intent" to break international law. Understandably, the inherent complexity involved in supply chain traceability and responsibility make it difficult to figure out who is truly to blame in these situations. Countries like the Ivory Coast are allegedly still plagued by child labor, and Stop the Traffik Australia activist Carolyn Kitto says that human trafficking is a continuing problem for the cocoa industry. We'd like to believe that initiatives like Cargill's Cocoa Promise are putting a dent in this practice, but small traders are often reportedly middlemen between the corporations' buying agents and the independent farmers perpetrating the illegal labor. Perhaps this case can at least bring about a more involved approach by these companies.