In 2001, the lucrative chocolate industry, due to pressure from NGOs, committed itself to putting an end to child labour in cacao plantations before 2006. 18 years later, has that promise been kept? The Ivory Coast, the world’s largest cacao producer, made a real effort to eradicate this scourge on the country. They built schools and trained farmers. Television adverts even reminded populations that child labour is illegal. So why does child exploitation still exist? Further into isolated areas of the forest, at the end of near-impassable roads, Paul Moreira discovered child slaves, forced to work in plantations, their incomes often seized by traffickers. These child slaves are separated from their parents and sometimes resold onto other traffickers.
Sixty years of producing standardized fruit and vegetables and creating industrial hybrids have had a dramatic impact on their nutritional content. The seeds that produce the fruits and vegetables we consume are now the property of a handful of multinationals.
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Food production has increasingly become a huge business for a handful of giant corporations. 'Soyalism' follows the industrial production chain of pork and the related soybean monoculture, from China to Brazil through the United States and Mozambique.
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The industrialization of the humble tomato preceded the globalized economy that was to follow. It is now as much of a commodity as wheat, rice, or petrol.
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