Reverse Trick or Treating Campaign in action

                              

          Photo courtesy Ben Block

Protest Pictures -CNN.com blogs

Hard work- Is there any end in sight?

 Photo courtesy    http://www.laborrights.org/stop-child-labor/cocoa-campaign

The Chocolate Menace Johan Cedeno

Dear Mr. Chocoholic,

                5,6,and7 year old working in a difficult working conditions with a machete in one hand and cocoa beans in the other. These little boys are wondering if they’re going to have enough to eat. Also we consumers are helping it happen. These are the dark truths revealed in the dark Side of Chocolate a documentary of child labor in the cocoa industry.

     Children are trafficked to the Ivory Coast to work with others cutting down cocoa beans and separating the cocoa seeds. They also don’t go to school, and may never see their parents again. They work and work and don’t get anything in return. The cruelty of being forced to work every day all-day. Traumatized kids who don’t even know what chocolate is. In 2001 journalists uncovered labor abuses of children in  the Ivory Coast. Frieda Denise Cooper wrote a poem how little kids are being trafficked and they work their hands off to separate cocoa.

      A young boy called Abdoul worked cutting down cocoa beans that he hasn’t even tasted chocolate and 75 percent of cocoa comes from the Ivory Coast. Being exposed to pesticides and fertilizers inhaling all those chemicals damages their bodies. Chocolate company that pay 1 euro for each kilo of cocoa seed don’t know or care that it was little boy who separated them. Do you realize when you eat chocolate it was probably made by a little boy using large machetes and surrounded by pesticides. Its says in Reverse “Trick or Treaters “ Deliver fair trade chocolate “there an outrageous number of children suffering from horrible back pain and other ergonomic neck issues between ages 5 and 18 just so you can have chocolate”. But we can change that instead of buying normal chocolate buy fair trade chocolate. Fair trade chocolate guarantees farmers that farmers receive of 150 dollars  on top of market prices for each ton of cocoa they produced.You should buy fair trade chocolate because the Hershey bar starts its life as cocoa beans, in the African nations of Ghana and Ivory Coast, where children are more likely to face hunger and mal nutrition’s than enjoy  the taste of a chocolate bar.

      Since we children are the ones who have a strong love for chocolate ,our voices would mean something. So let’s RAISE OUR VOICES!

The Dark Side Of Chocolate By Sheila Munim

The Dark Side of Chocolate

Dear Concerned Citizen,

                                      Did you know that the chocolate that you are eating are made by little chocolate hands of five, six, and seven year old slaves to make the candy bars that you can’t live without?according to a Poem Cocoa Beans by Frieda Dennis Cooper.

          Children in the supply chain work so hard because they’re forced to even though they don’t want to so they could earn a living. It is illegal for children to work at such a young age but still they cut down the cocoa pods even though they suffer and injure themselves.

     Cocoa comes mainly from Ivory Coast and West African countries. Children are trafficked to work on these farms. In 2006, 132 children were trafficked. In 2007, 140 children were trafficked. In 2008-2009, 150 children were also rescued.

     Some ways we can help the children and some of the ways people already did is that “Exchange students from India, Indonesia, Mozambique, and Switzerland joined reverse trick or treaters in the suburbs of Washington, D.C to deliver Fair Trade Chocolate’’. (Reverse Trick or Treating) Some other ways you can help them is by buying a Fair Trade chocolate.” “In the cocoa industry, Fair Trade standards guarantee that farmers receive a premium of $150 on top of market prices for each ton of cocoa they produce, as long as they meet specified labor.’’ (Reverse Trick or Treating)

   In conclusion, you have to be very careful about the type of chocolate you choose because it can be very tasty on the outside but inside, there’s a whole new story. It is very dark, thick and sour.

                                                                             Sincerely,

                                                                                      Sheila

Chocolate vs.Children Stephany Rueda 611

                      Chocolate vs. Child labor by Stephany Rueda

Dear chocolate lover,

      Children in the west coast of Africa work in cocoa farms. They are taken away from their families and are forced to work. Every year children suffer of child labor. At least 2 million children currently are involved in the production of cocoa in Ghana and the Ivory coast.

       While working in the cocoa farms children get bruises, scars, and even ill. The role of children is working to plant and harvest cocoa beans. They have to work all the day for only a few cents a day, you’ll see children with machete cutting down the cocoa beans. Some children don’t even know what the word “chocolate” means or never tasted it. They work the whole day. Some are wounded and children get exposed to pesticides of fertilizer. Children sometimes have to breathe in dirty air. And if they get sick there will be no one to help them.

        What we do to help them is buy Fair Trade Chocolate. Fair trade chocolate is when farmers get paid fairly for their chocolate cocoa beans. Fair trade standards guarantee that farmers receive premium of $150. People should take actions and stand up for child labor so it could end. Child labor is killing children. Its unfair because traffickers get paid and children who work all day and don’t get enough money to pay off their parents debt. Children in child labor never get education and never get to go to school.

Tragedy of chocolate Jeremy Rodriguez 611

 THE TRAGEDY OF CHOCOLATE

  

                                                             Jeremy Rodriguez 

   Dear chocolate lovers,

         Have you ever asked yourself how they make the delicious chocolate bar you eat? while you eat the delicious Chocolate bar on your furniture watching TV while the slave Children are work in 12 hours a day, die in fields for a dollar a day or nothing.  

     I believe we have to stand up and stop this tragedy. Children are being unfairly by working on fields 12 hours a day with no breaks, getting sick and even die for a dollar a day. We should buy fair trade chocolate instead of Hershey, and also we should raise the awareness about child labor in cocoa farms. Fair trade chocolate is chocolate that doesn’t involve child labor and farmers get more money.       

        We should also reverse trick or treating.( to hand out fair trade chocolate). We should also support raise the bar of Hershey campaign and  valentines activities.