Counterclockwise from the top, these are meant to remind you of of Toblerone (Mondelēz), Kit Kat (Hershey/Nestlé), Twix (Mars) and...I’m not sure about the last one, although to Erin Hallstrom, our digital editor, it looks like Callebaut. It’s not just the labels, either; the candy inside resembles the target. For example, the Kit Kat parody is “Milk chocolate with wafer and cookie pieces.” All the labels bear imprecations: “...because all chocolate should be made without modern slavery and illegal child labor.”
Paul Schoenmakers, whose title at Tony’s is “head of impact,” says that voluntary measures and self-regulation aren’t enough. “With these bars, we aren’t pointing a finger,” he said in a statement. “We’re raising our voice, again, to raise awareness, and start a movement for necessary positive change. We’re not assigning blame; we’re calling on everyone to take responsibility. If we want 100% slave free to be the norm in chocolate, we need legislation, and we need everyone to play their part.”
I don’t know how much of an impact the spoof bars will have, but Schoenmakers is right. As the years roll on, it’s becoming increasingly clear that what we’re getting from the chocolate giants about child/slave labor is basically lip service. That became clear in 2011, when an industry trade group claimed in a letter to the Labor Department that tracing the provenance of its cocoa to ensure it doesn’t come from child/slave labor is just too daunting a task.
That’s a load of chocolate-colored stuff. Product tracing has made huge strides, though blockchain and other technologies. If Cargill can tell you which farm your Thanksgiving turkey comes from, I have a hard time believing that the chocolate bigwigs can’t trace the source of a load of cocoa beans.
It’s not that they want to use child labor. It’s that the first one to go ahead and pull the plug on unethically sourced cocoa will find its supply costs shooting up to the point where it will be at an insurmountable competitive disadvantage. All the seals of approval and glowing press releases in the world won’t help you if your products cost 5% or 10% or 15% more than your competitors’.
That’s why governments, in Africa and in the West, have to step in and do their job, which is to set minimal ethical standards. As long as it’s cheaper to make something that a lot of people want by making other people suffer on the other side of the world, that’s what’s going to happen.
Pan Demetrakakes is a Senior Editor for Food Processing and has been a business journalist since 1992, mostly covering various aspects of the food production and supply chain, including processing, packaging, distribution and retailing. Learn more about him or contact him