Online campaigners make it tricky for one chocolate Halloween treat

More than 50,000 consumers have signed an online petition urging a US chocolate maker to buy certified child labour-free cocoa in time for Halloween.

In one of the largest ever petitions directed at a particular company’s human rights record, the campaign calls on Hershey to make amends for lagging behind on the cocoa industry’s biggest single issue for years.

Launched by the ‘Raise the Bar, Hershey!’ coalition of NGOs, which published an ‘alternative’ CSR report to coincide with the firm’s debut in the area last year (EP12, issue 7, p3), the petition says the company should bring its practices into line with the rest of the industry, and abide by its own commitments to stamp out child slavery.

It states: “While many chocolate companies have taken steps to trace their cocoa supply chains and implement labour rights standards among their suppliers, Hershey lags behind its competitors in responsibly sourcing its cocoa.

Unlike other companies, Hershey has not committed to sourcing cocoa for its main product lines that has been independently certified to comply with international labour rights standards.”

Halloween is one of the most lucrative periods for US chocolate firms and the petition’s organisers expect to have 75,000 ‘signatures’ by the date.