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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

#61

Post by zizee »

autoexec wrote: post #34
the-alchemist wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This. We would all benefit from more cause and effect analysis in our media. - Let's say we increase prices that we pay cocoa farmers, even double the price - Is this extra enough to send the girl to school an hour away, pay for her books, etc.? If you pay the family more, how do you know they would spend it on the girl's education? Maybe fixing the water well or building a sturdier house is more important. Or paying…

> Historically, almost every country that has "developed" into an "industrialized" nation has had a very difficult, dangerous, violent learning curve. Historically, countries that industrialized didn't have an extensive history of examples to learn from and they had to figure it out for themselves. Every currently developing country doesn't get their own turn at being horrible to people or the environment. The develo…

Are you saying rich countries should force poor countries to adopt to their ethical and moral codes? Should they adopt all of them, like our stringent building codes? What about minimum wages? Vehicle safety standards?

I'm being supercilious, but hopefully you can see the problem.

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

#62

Post by tdb7893 »

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…

They've been aware for a long time now and are content to exploit the situation and now definitely share culpability. There's more than enough blame to pass some of it around.

The fact that they pay people wages where they work and still live in abject poverty while raking in a literally obscene amount of wealth is not right.

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

#63

Post by 31337Logic »

bouncycastle wrote: post #37

All I see these days is kids watching mindless youtube/tik-tok videos all day. Perhaps sending them to a farm for some movement might actually be good for them & give them a sense of accomplishment. Seize their phones before they go.

Younger me would have laughed (or even wanted to insult you) over this comment. Older me just gave you an upvote for it. I think you're on to something.

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

#64

Post by tcbawo »

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…

I would agree with this sentiment if they this was voluntary labor. Others have pointed out that trafficking, beatings, and forced labor are also components.

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

#65

Post by dumpsterlid »

goldenshale wrote: post #56

Wait, you mean kids in developing countries work in order to help their families survive poverty. Oh my word, we should stop buying chocolate. Or wait, then nobody is making any money. Seriously, haven't we learned from the "Chinese sweatshop" hysteria throughout the 2000s that if people want to work they are often digging themselves out of a whole rather than being forced into one?

[dead]

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

#66

Post by throwboatyface »

goldenshale wrote: post #56

Wait, you mean kids in developing countries work in order to help their families survive poverty. Oh my word, we should stop buying chocolate. Or wait, then nobody is making any money. Seriously, haven't we learned from the "Chinese sweatshop" hysteria throughout the 2000s that if people want to work they are often digging themselves out of a whole rather than being forced into one?

What if we, I don't know, did something to fix the poverty?

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

#67

Post by otikik »

colechristensen wrote: post #55
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.

From the ages from about 5 to 18 American children are forced to do office work for 7 hours a day five days a week in conditions that approximate a minimum security prison followed by often several hours of more work to do at home. Is the only reason you think that isn't "child labor" because no one is directly paying them for their work or that the work is "good for them"? Plenty of kids would argue picking fruit wa…

I am sorry you had such a horrible experience at school. I’m not denying that what you say can happen, but for contrast, my 7yo son enjoys his school greatly and even misses it during holidays.

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

#68

Post by adamredwoods »

RcouF1uZ4gsC wrote: post #4

> Munira, 15, is one of those children. She has worked in the cocoa fields since she was 5 years old. Education is a luxury, with her school an hour-long walk away and transportation options expensive. Last year, her family harvested only one bag of decent-quality cocoa. A 140-pound bag of the product fetches only about $115. I think child labor is actually a symptom of a deeper problem and cracking down on child lab…

Also, to be clear, do we know if it is acceptable for the mother or father bringing the child to work? Was the child helping or actually working (being on a list tells me they were probably employed)? And at what age in a country is it acceptable to begin work?

We should not treat all countries and cultures the same through our western perspective.

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

#69

Post by ilrwbwrkhv »

JumpCrisscross wrote: post #35
ilrwbwrkhv wrote: post #32

I mean this is nothing new? If you bought an iPhone you were part of exploiting child labor. Will you stop buying an iPhone? Of course not. We should ideally stop showing such fake interest in these things and focus on other things. https://www.thefp.com/p/your-iphone-was-built-with-child

> should ideally stop showing such fake interest in these things Perfect is the enemy of good [1]. We don't have to completely solve a problem to make discussing it worthwhile. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Perfect_is_the_enemy_of_good

Sure we can keep discussing it and feeling good about ourselves.

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

#70

Post by autoexec »

zizee wrote: post #61
autoexec wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Historically, almost every country that has "developed" into an "industrialized" nation has had a very difficult, dangerous, violent learning curve. Historically, countries that industrialized didn't have an extensive history of examples to learn from and they had to figure it out for themselves. Every currently developing country doesn't get their own turn at being horrible to people or the environment. The develo…

Are you saying rich countries should force poor countries to adopt to their ethical and moral codes? Should they adopt all of them, like our stringent building codes? What about minimum wages? Vehicle safety standards? I'm being supercilious, but hopefully you can see the problem.

I'm saying that rich countries shouldn't enable or accept poor countries exploiting child slaves and polluting the planet we all share because "it's their turn now". That's flawed logic.

We certainly shouldn't force other countries to follow our morals, but we shouldn't give them our money and support or make excuses for them while they act like monsters either. We should encourage them to do better, help them when we can, and lead by example. At a minimum we should be holding our own nation's corporations accountable when they're knowingly profiting from children being trafficked and enslaved.

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