5 Things You Should Know About Chocolate Sustainability
3 min reading time
In this day and age, sustainability is a term we hear often when it comes to agricultural products such as cocoa beans. But as much as sustainability is mentioned, many people are unsure exactly what it is, what it encompasses, and how they can play a key role in cocoa sustainability efforts. For as much as everyone here at Royal Wholesale loves chocolate, it's extremely important to us that we do our part to ensure that cocoa production thrives for years to come. Since beginning our exclusive channel partnership with Cargill, a world-renown producer of the finest quality chocolate products, we've learned a lot about their cocoa sustainability initiative The Cargill Cocoa Promise. Our knowledge of cocoa sustainability has grown exponentially and we would like to take this opportunity to share some of this knowledge with you.
What is cocoa sustainability?
Cocoa sustainability is all about effecting positive change in cocoa communities around the world while securing a thriving cocoa sector for generations to come. Cargill works to improve farmer and community livelihoods through training, coaching, environmental protection, technology, innovation, and the valuable partnerships.
Improving Farmer and Community Livelihoods
Unfortunately, poverty and child labor are all too common in cocoa farming communities across the world. Cargill is tackling these issues head-on in many ways. By providing training, tools, financing and other resources, farmers and communities are better equipped than ever before to be successful cocoa farmers. Cargill also strives to empower women to enter into cocoa farming, thus creating higher household incomes and better educated, healthier children. With more successful adult farmers, the need for child labor will no longer be needed. The goal is that, one day, farmers will eventually become self-sustaining and no longer need outside support.
Environmental Protection
Every year 46-58 thousand square miles of forests are destroyed around the world to clear land for agriculture and infrastructure. Deforestation leads to drastic increases in greenhouse gas emissions, less biodiversity and a reduction in rainfall that helps sustain agriculture. Reducing deforestation, and therefore climate change, is crucial to future global food and cocoa security. Cargill has pledged to end deforestation across their agricultural supply chains by 2030.
Supply Chain Transparency
Businesses and consumers are more concerned than ever before about the standards behind the products they buy. Tracking the origin of cocoa and how it has been produced can prove to be quite difficult. Cargill aims to increase transparency in cocoa supply chains through regular audits of farmer organizations by internationally-recognized independent certification schemes. They hope to one day create a fully digital traceability system using technologies such as GPS mapping, digital data collection, mobile money, geotagging and radio-frequency identification.
How You Can Support Cocoa Sustainability
As a business owner, you can help to support cocoa sustainability by simply being aware of how the chocolate products you're purchasing are being produced. Purchasing high quality chocolate products produced by a company such as Cargill, means you're helping to support the production of cocoa sourced in a sustainable, environmentally-friendly way, with high regard for social standards and ethical economic practices.
