Chocolate fudge cake, Urban Diner, Edmonton, Canada, Author Mack Male (CC BY-SA 2.0 Generic)
Chocolate is a pure delight. But there is a bitter truth behind the sweet taste. Child labor is heavily involved in cocoa product [1][2][3].
Multiple human rights organizations confirm that over 1.5 million children in West Africa work under hazardous conditions to produce cocoa. Many of these children are the victims of forced labor, human trafficking, and modern slavery. They are deprived of an education, and exposed to dangerous chemicals and equipment.
This exploitation is ongoing despite the public pledges made by major chocolate companies over the past 20 years to eliminate child labor from their supply chains. Some of the most recognizable chocolate brands still associated with unethical practices include: Hershey’s Chocolate; Nestle’s Chocolate (Kit Kat, Butterfinger); Mars Chocolate (M&M’s, Snickers, Twix); Ferrero (Nutella, Kinder); and Mondelez (Toblerone, Cadbury).
There are smaller chocolatiers committed to ethical sourcing and transparency. These make efforts to assure that farmers are paid fairly and work under safe, voluntary conditions through Direct Trade, Fair Trade, Rainforest Alliance or bean-to-bar production in which the manufacturer controls every step of the process.
The ethically sourced brands (available at Walmart, Target, Whole Foods, Amazon, and elsewhere) include: Alter Ego, Beyond Good, Divine Chocolate, Endangered Species Chocolate, Equal Exchange, Raaka Chocolate, Theo Chocolate, Tony’s Chocolonely, and Unreal Snacks.
As consumers, we can reach out to chocolate companies asking that they disclose their supply chains, commit to a living wage for workers, put an end to child labor, and submit to independent audits.
As Christians, we must make conscientious purchases supporting brands which value people over profit.
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[1] Wikipedia, “Child labour in cocoa production”, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Child_labour_in_cocoa_production.
[2] Humanium, “The dark side of chocolate: child labor in the cocoa industry” by Arianna Braga, 8/20/24, https://www.humanium.org/en/the-dark-side-of-chocolate-child-labour-in-the-cocoa-industry/ .
[3] Felician Magazine, Fall 2025, pp. 12-13, “The Bittersweet Truth about Chocolate”.
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A Voice Reclaimed, Surviving Child Abuse and More 
Thank you, Anna, for the list of fair-trade companies. So far, I hadn’t come across these, but I’ll certainly pass the list on to my family.
In practice, we rarely buy branded chocolate — and never from supermarkets (most taste awfully). Instead, we usually buy handcrafted chocolate from a local chocolatier every couple of months. My wife also makes her own chocolate from cocoa butter twice a year, for Christmas and Easter, though in that case it’s difficult to verify whether the cocoa butter itself comes from fair-trade sources.
That said, the boys occasionally manage to talk us into buying M&Ms — or simply get them from vending machines. Perhaps sharing your list with them will help curb that habit a little.
This is a complex world. Supply chains (and lives) are intertwined, whether we realize it or not. I applaud your approach, though few of us are likely to follow your wife’s example and make our own chocolate. 🙂
Making one’s own chocolate is quite an arduous process — it involves far more steps than simply cooking a mass, and it is both time-consuming and expensive. I keep trying, gently, to persuade her to buy chocolate from a professional chocolatier instead. That said, this is rather thin ice to tread on, as suggestions of this sort can occasionally provoke a distinctly fierce reaction.
Perhaps your wife enjoys the challenge of a difficult process.
I guess you are definitely right, she is challenge oriented in general. Another layer of her brief fury may well have been a misunderstanding, leaving her believe for a second that I was preferring chocolate from vendors over her own.
Or a misunderstanding that you did not believe her up to the challenge.
I never doubted her ability to make good chocolate. The failure was mine. Her reaction was likely rooted in a rural Slavic cultural reflex—despite her outwardly worldly demeanor—where preferring food made by a stranger, when it could be made by one’s wife, is understood as an affront. I should have seen this immediately.
Instead, I missed it, as I so often do: blind to the fine grain of cultures other than my own, and too frequently inattentive even to the unspoken rules of the culture I inhabit myself.
The last thing anyone would ever call you is “inattentive”, Hubert. Besides which we all make mistakes, small and large. I’m sure your wife is not as hard on you as you are on yourself. 🙂
I had no idea this was an issue, so I appreciate you bringing some awareness to this. I can’t say that chocolate is a part of my dietary allowances, but it’s alarming to know that something as taken for granted as chocolate holds similarities to better known criminal industries (diamonds come to mind). Thanks for the info, Anna!
So true, we should support Fairtrade principles and practices. Thank you for sharing.
I’m saddened at how many ways human can sin
It’s painful to realize how much exploitation hides behind something as simple as chocolate. Highlighting this topic once more and giving a voice to the voiceless feels incredibly important Anna!
Thank you for your concern, Anna. ❤
Thank you for alerting us to these big brand companies that are exploiting children in West Africa and giving us a list of alternative brands that I’m going to be on the lookout for. (No more Nestle’s Kit Kats for me.)