Valentine's day is coming in a month. Who's planning to buy lots and lots of CHOCOLATE?
This year, whether you're buying chocolate for your lover, friends, or even yourself, be mindful of who you buy from. Most of the chocolates being sold today are made from cacao farms who practice slavery and child labour. Many of the children are hopelessly stuck in their situation through kidnapping and suffer unspeakable abuse from their bosses. Other farms that are in "better condition" are paid an unfair price for their work, and as a result, can barely support their families - let alone sending their children to school.
Do you really want to support companies who engage in such immorality for their own profit?
The good news is, my fellow Hamiltonians, you can find the following Fair Trade brands quite easily:
- Cadbury (milk chocolate only) @ most grocery/ convenience stores (Fairtrade, ~$3 per 100g bar)
- Green & Black's @ Fortinos, The Barn (Fairtrade organic, ~$3.50 per 100g bar)
- Camino @ Fortinos, The Barn (Fairtrade, mainly dark chocolates, ~$3.50 per 100g bar)
- Gallerie au Chocolat @ Ecomystic (Fairtrade, hot chocolate available, $4.95 per 95g bar, $9.95 per 200g package of hot chocolate)
You can also find out more places to buy fairtrade products in the Hamilton Fair Trade Directory.
If you're thinking of giving several people chocolate, you can break up the bars and wrap them individually yourself using wax and tissue paper and ribbon or string. You can also buy from Sweet Earth Chocolates (online) who sell individually wrapped small chocolate hearts. Fairtrade Organic. http://mama-ganache.com/prod.itml/icOid/172
It's also a great idea for a school fundraiser!
Buying organic also means the workers aren't exposed daily to dangerous chemicals (sometimes with little protection). It also protects their precious water and soil from contamination, which is good for their health and the environment!
What I find about FT chocolates is that they have very interesting flavours you should try out (e.g. greentea, sea salt, ginger, butterscotch crunch, just to name a few)
FT isn't a perfect system-it gets especially complicated when talking about cacao products. The brands listed above aren't perfect either, but they're better than the big companies who don't even try.
If you want to be intense about making sure your chocolate is slave labour free, check out this amazing list: http://www.foodispower.org/chocolatelist.php . You may have to buy online but you have a month! ;).
Sharing with your friends and family, and take a personal pledge not to give or receive non-fairtrade chocolates or cacao products!
Picture modified from Fairtrade Canada's logo.
