Child Labor Grows in Certain Areas of Cocoa Production
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November 2020
Cocoa and chocolate are a $100 billion industry, and child labor has been a persistent part of cocoa production. Almost 1.5 million children are engaged in hazardous child labor on cocoa farms in Côte d’Ivoire and Ghana, which together produce almost 60 percent of the world’s cocoa.
“We had direct access to senior government officials, industry representatives, and civil society groups while conducting the cocoa study. The rigor and transparency of our work helped engender trust on all sides, and our report’s focus on actionable insights will make it easier to develop effective interventions.”
NORC has released a report that measures the scope of child labor in these countries and assesses the effectiveness of interventions to combat it. The report is the result of a five-year, mixed-methods study NORC conducted for the U.S. Department of Labor. The study found that the prevalence rate of child labor in high-production areas remained stable between 2008-09 and 2018-19 but increased significantly in medium- and low-production areas, suggesting that interventions to limit child labor need to target these areas more. The study’s qualitative data also suggested ways to make new and existing interventions more effective.
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