Nestlé and Mondelēz among chocolate giants facing child slavery lawsuit over supply chain practices
A human rights firm has filed a lawsuit against major chocolate companies Nestlé, Cargill, Barry Callebaut, Mars, Olam, Hershey and Mondelēz, following allegations of child slave labour in their cocoa supply chains.
Pictured: Fresh cocoa fruit. Stock image.
The class-action lawsuit, filed in Washington DC by International Rights Advocates, concerns eight individuals from Mali who claim that they were forced to work without pay on cocoa plantations on the Ivory Coast during the 2000s and 2010s.
These plantations regularly supplied the corporates named during the period specified, the plaintiffs claim, with the end-user businesses having a “dominant influence” on practices. While the end-user businesses did not own the farms in question, International Rights Advocates is aiming to convince the courts that they “knowingly profited” from illegal child labour.