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Cocoa harvested by kids as young as 5 in Ghana: CBS News investigation

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Re: Cocoa harvested by kids as young as 5 in Ghana: CBS News investigation

#41

Post by toomuchtodo »

josu wrote: post #16
janice1999 wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Call me a bleeding heart but child labor is an 'actual' problem. You can keep destructing societal issues until you reinvent the universe from scratch. It may be difficult to solve global poverty but it's not a lot to ask extremely profitable companies to enforce the supply chain checks they've committed to.

Child labor tends to go away with the increase in GDP.

Children go away when women are empowered. To starve the world of child labor, empower women.

https://ourworldindata.org/fertility-rate#empowerment-of-wom...

Re: Cocoa harvested by kids as young as 5 in Ghana: CBS News investigation

#42

Post by tdb7893 »

java-man wrote: post #2

Charge the CEOs of companies that buy cocoa with child abuse.

It'll be a cold day in hell before a CEO gets charged for any crimes that they oversee (at least without seriously defrauding another corporation or rich person). Not a single Sackler is in jail for causing the opioid crisis.

Re: Cocoa harvested by kids as young as 5 in Ghana: CBS News investigation

#43

Post by mopsi »

janice1999 wrote: post #14
bell-cot wrote: post #3

> Munira, 15, is one of those children. [...] Last year, her family harvested only one bag of decent-quality cocoa. A 140-pound bag of the product fetches only about $115. Sounds like "child labor" is downstream of the actual problem.

Call me a bleeding heart but child labor is an 'actual' problem. You can keep destructing societal issues until you reinvent the universe from scratch. It may be difficult to solve global poverty but it's not a lot to ask extremely profitable companies to enforce the supply chain checks they've committed to.

In Europe and the US, it wasn't too long ago either when families could only afford to send some of their children to school. Others had to work from a very early age to support the family. If you ban child labor without offering anything to supplement the lost income, then you're just harming them more.

I think it would be better to frame the issue as why so little of the profit made from their work reaches them. It's insane to see cocoa farmers so poor that they've never tasted chocolate, as can be seen here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zEN4hcZutO0

Re: Cocoa harvested by kids as young as 5 in Ghana: CBS News investigation

#44

Post by yawboakye »

ghanaian here:

it’s not the business of mars (m&m makers) to ensure that no children are exploited during the production of the cocoa beans. and americans shouldn’t eat their chocolate with some trepidation that they might be eating the body and blood of a 5-yo.

we, not they, commit these boys and girls to these activities, of our own volition. it’s a fucked up society that looks to hold an external party responsible for ills within itself. if child labor is bad, we don’t need mars and the rest of the world to tell us so. we should be civilized enough to get ourselves out of the ongoing era of barbarism and brutishness that has plagued the continent. fuck!

Re: Cocoa harvested by kids as young as 5 in Ghana: CBS News investigation

#45

Post by rurp »

bell-cot wrote: post #39
janice1999 wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Call me a bleeding heart but child labor is an 'actual' problem. You can keep destructing societal issues until you reinvent the universe from scratch. It may be difficult to solve global poverty but it's not a lot to ask extremely profitable companies to enforce the supply chain checks they've committed to.

If (as the article states) the total value of the cocoa that Murina's entire family managed to harvest, in an entire year, was $115 - that sounds like destitute, desperate poverty to me. If actually living in such circumstances, ~all humans put their kids to work, and lie as needed to survive. And if the "child labor certification" inspectors you send are anything resembling decent human beings, then they will send b…

Yeah, exactly. Under these types of conditions most kids will be starving and living in dangerous conditions. Not working doesn't mean they get to go to school or to a playground, it means their family is even more starving.

Re: Cocoa harvested by kids as young as 5 in Ghana: CBS News investigation

#46

Post by abracadaniel »

mopsi wrote: post #43
janice1999 wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Call me a bleeding heart but child labor is an 'actual' problem. You can keep destructing societal issues until you reinvent the universe from scratch. It may be difficult to solve global poverty but it's not a lot to ask extremely profitable companies to enforce the supply chain checks they've committed to.

In Europe and the US, it wasn't too long ago either when families could only afford to send some of their children to school. Others had to work from a very early age to support the family. If you ban child labor without offering anything to supplement the lost income, then you're just harming them more. I think it would be better to frame the issue as why so little of the profit made from their work reaches them. It…

If you ban child labor the jobs don't go away. The process still requires the same amount of labor. So, employment will increase, and with the higher labor demand, so will wages. Either way, the product is profitable and in high demand so the same or more money will be spent producing it. Child labor is one of the reasons why so little of the profit from their work reaches them. They're subsidizing the industry by sacrificing their children to increase labor availability.

Re: Cocoa harvested by kids as young as 5 in Ghana: CBS News investigation

#47

Post by MyShawdowySelf »

toomuchtodo wrote: post #41
josu wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Child labor tends to go away with the increase in GDP.

Children go away when women are empowered. To starve the world of child labor, empower women. https://ourworldindata.org/fertility-rate#empowerment-of-wom...

So your solution to not treating children baddly is to not have children? Seems a bit strange instead of just ... you know pay people a descent wage so they don't have to put they children in arms way

Re: Cocoa harvested by kids as young as 5 in Ghana: CBS News investigation

#48

Post by toomuchtodo »

MyShawdowySelf wrote: post #47
toomuchtodo wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Children go away when women are empowered. To starve the world of child labor, empower women. https://ourworldindata.org/fertility-rate#empowerment-of-wom...

So your solution to not treating children baddly is to not have children? Seems a bit strange instead of just ... you know pay people a descent wage so they don't have to put they children in arms way

As my uncouth grandfather used to say: “Wishes in one hand, shit in the other, which will fill first?” These children work because they have no choice. They are paid these wages because they can’t make more.

I suggest empowering women who don’t want children to not have them. If we look at the developed world, it is clear the total fertility rate will settle far below replacement rate (2.1) and child labor will dry up when women are educated and have robust access to family planning.

Perpetual labor shortages are a better outcome than surplus labor and lives of suffering, most especially children suffering.

By all means, open your wallet to pay these kids a living wage. I’ll even help you bootstrap the direct cash transfer mechanisms via mobile payments if you have deep pockets. But that is unlikely to happen. Hope is not a strategy.

https://www.unicef.org/protection/child-labour ("Nearly 1 in 10 children are subjected to child labour worldwide, with some forced into hazardous work through trafficking.")

https://ourworldindata.org/child-labor ("The International Labour Organisation states in its latest World Report on Child Labour (2013) that there are around 265 million working children in the world—almost 17 per cent of the worldwide child population. According to the publicly available data discussed in more detail below, Sub-Saharan Africa is the region where child labour is most prevalent.")

https://www.vox.com/23971366/declining-birth-rate-fertility-... ("You can’t even pay people to have more kids")

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6198592/ ("Challenges and perspectives of child labor")

Re: Cocoa harvested by kids as young as 5 in Ghana: CBS News investigation

#49

Post by autoexec »

yawboakye wrote: post #44

ghanaian here: it’s not the business of mars (m&m makers) to ensure that no children are exploited during the production of the cocoa beans. and americans shouldn’t eat their chocolate with some trepidation that they might be eating the body and blood of a 5-yo. we, not they, commit these boys and girls to these activities, of our own volition. it’s a fucked up society that looks to hold an external party responsible…

> it’s a fucked up society that looks to hold an external party responsible for ills within itself.

I agree with you there, however Mars knowingly exploits children so that they can stuff their own pockets with cash. That too is sick and the US should hold them accountable for that for our own sake.

We've spent a long time profiting from slavery in this country and more recently we've patted ourselves on the back for ending slavery while in reality we simply outsourced it and moved the slave plantations out of sight. We should absolutely think about what it is we're supporting while we buy or eat chocolate.

Re: Cocoa harvested by kids as young as 5 in Ghana: CBS News investigation

#50

Post by NumberWangMan »

abracadaniel wrote: post #46
mopsi wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In Europe and the US, it wasn't too long ago either when families could only afford to send some of their children to school. Others had to work from a very early age to support the family. If you ban child labor without offering anything to supplement the lost income, then you're just harming them more. I think it would be better to frame the issue as why so little of the profit made from their work reaches them. It…

If you ban child labor the jobs don't go away. The process still requires the same amount of labor. So, employment will increase, and with the higher labor demand, so will wages. Either way, the product is profitable and in high demand so the same or more money will be spent producing it. Child labor is one of the reasons why so little of the profit from their work reaches them. They're subsidizing the industry by sa…

Everyone is better off if children don’t work, but if everyone else has their children work and you don’t, you lose. Sounds like moloch!

(I’m ignoring corporate profits and consumer prices for simplicity-but I think most of us would be happy if child labor was banned even if it meant higher prices)

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