This Valentines Day, Give Your Sweetie Fair Trade-Certified Treats | Change.org News.

Many folks will surprise their sweethearts today with an assortment of chocolate goodies. While treats like Hershey’s Chocolate Hearts may taste sweet, they often hide a cruel secret — child labor and exploitation.

As The Atlantic reports, the majority of the world’s cacao — the bean from which chocolate bars are produced — is grown and harvested in Africa. One-third of the world’s cocoa beans come from Cote d’Ivoire, while another 30 percent of the global supply originates in Ghana, Nigeria, and Cameroon. The rest comes from Central and South America. These countries’ six million cocoa farmers churn out about three million tons of cocoa beans every, single year.

That steady stream of beans keeps major chocolate manufacturers like Hershey’s in business. There’s just one problem: Hershey’s profits come at the cost of child labor, exploitation of impoverished farmers, human trafficking, and unfair labor practices.

The majority of the world’s cocoa beans come from family farmers in Africa. Oftentimes these farms rely on child labor, preventing kids from attending school and exposing them to dangers like chemical pesticides and herbicides. According to the American Federation of Teachers, about 3.6 million children in West Africa work on cocoa farmers, some of whom were trafficked illegally. Child slavery is especially prevalent on Cote d’Ivoire cocoa farms, where there are about 15,000 kids subjected to slavery. It’s a situation that has many referring to cocoa beans’ final product as “blood chocolate.”

These kinds of dangerous, unfair conditions are perpetuated by the incredibly low wages farmers receive for their cocoa beans. Like most commodities, the chocolate industry is dominated by a few major players.According to The Atlantic, the world’s top 10 chocolate manufacturers are responsible for 40 percent of global chocolate sales. These companies have a chokehold on the chocolate industry, demanding a steady supply of beans at rock-bottom prices. Corporations like Hershey’s rake in billions of dollars a year, while the most important part of the chocolate business — the farmers — make mere pittances.

Fair Trade certification aims to make the chocolate industry a whole lot sweeter. This third-party certification system ensures that cocoa beans come from farms that don’t rely on forced or child labor. It also mandates that farmers must receive a fair wage for their product, preventing the kinds of extortion and exploitation that have become so prevalent in the chocolate industry.

Companies from Kraft to Nestle to Ben & Jerry’s have made at least some kind of commitment to investigate where their cocoa comes from and work with certifiers to eliminate unfair labor practices in their supply chains. Hershey’s, however, stubbornly refuses to embrace Fair Trade-certified cocoa despite boasting record profits this year. It’s time that the company ditched the dark side of its chocolate empire.Sign International Labor Rights Forum’s petition asking Hershey’s to incorporate Fair Trade-certified cocoainto its supply chain.

Photo credit: Magic Madzik via Flickr

Green Goes Simple: Family Footprints

Play-and-learn Games for Kids

By Marisa Belger for Green Goes Simple

As a busy working mom, I’m big on multitasking. I want to clock some quality time with my little one while also having fun and teaching him a thing or two. Too much to ask? Not at all! These family-friendly eco-games will teach your kids about complicated environmental issues (e.g., What is climate change, anyway? Why are some animals endangered? How do I really reduce my carbon footprint?) while they’re having fun!

High-tech Fun
Make computer time together time with online eco-games that will keep fingers clicking and minds expanding. The under-6 set will enjoy PLANETPALS ’ bright and simple graphics. Look for easy activities like “The Litterbug Says ,” where little hands can scroll over pictures of everyday items — magazines, a plastic milk carton, plastic and paper bags — and learn a fun green fact about them (e.g., Magazines: “Every ton of paper that is recycled saves 17 trees.”).

Older kids (7 to 14) can spend hours playing games on MeetTheGreens.org. The site features 11 animated webisodes about Izz and Dex, teens who take on everyday eco-issues. The coordinating games are just as cool. Thrifty Threads lets kids create new designs out of old clothes, Light It Right is a fast-paced exercise in using energy wisely, and Inconceivable delivers eco-stats in hip, kid-friendly language (e.g., “We get most of our energy from oil and coal, but we can also get it from wind, waves, the sun, corn, cow poop, algae and many other sources.”). Very fun!

Eco-friendly Board Games
Keep “Monopoly,” with its boardwalks and hotels, on the shelf. You and your gang are ready for a new and improved ’opoly. How about one that encourages participants to collect carbon credits and exchange them for clean air? “Earthopoly” is eco-friendly through and through: made from recycled paper and vegetable-oil-based ink, and chock full of eco-lessons. Complete the collection with “Garden-Opoly,” “Oceanopoly” and “Bug-Opoly” — an ’opoly for every taste!

Younger players (4 and up) can join the fun with “A Beautiful Place.” This simple, cheerful eco-game encourages everyone to work together to make Planet Earth beautiful.

A Greener Deck of Cards
Traditional card games are fun and pretty eco-friendly. (Hey, you’re not using energy watching TV!) But Xeko is much more than a 10-minute hand of gin rummy. Players become Xeko Masters, with the goal of “restoring balance to the Earth’s ecosystems.” Children as young as 8 can play Xeko, but the game is recommended for those between the ages of 13 and 30. An added eco-benefit? The cards are made from recycled stock and printed with soy-based ink.

Marisa Belger’s work has appeared in Travel + Leisure Family, Natural Health, Prevention and TODAYShow.com, where she wrote a column about eco-friendly living. She was an editor at Lime.com and collaborated with author Josh Dorfman on his bestselling books, The Lazy Environmentalist and The Lazy Environmentalist on a Budget.