Nestle

when Tony’s Chocolonely started up based on slave free, the financial journals were doing headlines like “will they be able to survive this bold new direction?”

They eventually found the cocoa market to be almost impossible to separate from slavery. They still do their best, which is a lot more than most, but they don't make any guarantees
- They have some argument for doing business with one of the largest processors who’s not the worst but not provably ethical. Discouraging.
  Found it:
  At Tony’s, we exist so make all chocolate 100% slave-free, not just our own. That means climbing into the lion’s den and tackling change from within. It means getting to the root of the problem and paving the way for others by proving the scalability of our solutions.
  Surprised that the processor, Barry Callebaut, is down for Tony to publish such blunt criticism of them. It’s like “don’t worry, Barry’s made a totally separate production line for us - only the Barry’s non-Tony production line contains the slave blood!”
Man, capitalism is just fucking wild, isn't it?
- like Nestlé getting out of a child slavery lawsuit because none of the slavery happened in the US?
- Isn't*
- Just about put an end to extreme poverty, that’s pretty impressive.
I have yet to see proof that Tony's is actually slavery free. And if it isn't (as in "we are doing oUr BeSt") then why the hell would I buy from them instead of... not buying chooclate?
- Because they pay a lot more to the producers.
I'm parsing this, but here is their explanation:
https://tonyschocolonely.com/uk/en/why-we-still-wont-say-were-100-slave-free

why is it in quotes

Because slavery is so prevalent in cocoa farms that it's impossible to guarantee that no slave labor was used. Even if they make an effort use ethical sources they still can't make that guarantee.
- Well, yeah, but also, if this is Nestlé, it's likely just too expensive to make sure.
  Gotta have that unsustainable, permanent growth.
ironically slave free …
We are (big air quotes) "slave free".
It's the cartoon style. Notice the curve after "WE'RE" and above the c in "chocolate"
If I see quotes like that on packaging, I treat it as a verifiable lie

John Oliver covered this on Last Week Tonight. tl;dw Cocoa is almost exclusively grown in Ghana and Cote d'Ivoire, two West African countries. Most of these farms are family run and there are millions of them. All the Cocoa they produce is purchased by a few companies who dictate price. Because they buy at such a low price, the only way these farms make money is if they force children in their families to work the farm for no compensation. Ie. Child slavery.

The worst part is that the organizations that audit the farms in an effort to reduce slavery fail spectacularly. The Farms receive notice of the audit and what they hope not to find in advance, and then the audits only occur at most every 6 months but more likely every few years. A documentary team of students took a trip out to a few farms that receive these audits and found Child Slavery immediately.
Not just children in their family, even children from other regions are kidnapped and forced to work on the farms. It's genuine, old fashioned, slavery.

No it's "slave free tm." Wich is just a trademark not a declaration.

Now with 40% less slavery!

Only applies to packaging.

Sustainably sourced inmates is great and all, but are they carbon neutral?

Is that like gluten free? How many slaves are ground into a regular bar of chocolate?

It depends on how dark it is.
- I like my chocolate like I like this joke. Dark.
Free Ghanian slaves! *
(*with purchase of regular-priced Ghanian slaves)

I like how they tried to incorporate the quotation marks as some sort of quirky font by adding it above chocolate as well, yet it is still obvious.

- They just work for free because of the "implications"

Wonder if it's like cagefree or free range chicken where the label is actually meaningless and could be actively misleading and still legal.

Yeah probably when they say "slave free," they mean
our slaves are free because we don't have to pay for them 💡 😁
- "Free as in free beer, not free as in freedom"
They call them serfs now. Feudalism is back baby.
- Feudalism is back in the menu boys!
If it's chocolate, definitely yes. If it's Nestle, also definitely yes.

So other political and economic systems do not have a history of slaves too? Whenever I see things blaming capitalism for our issues I worry as it means we are no laser focused on the root cause of these sorts of issues…centralized powers getting too big and unchecked no matter their political flavour.

Any social hierarchy requires centralized power. It just happens that capitalism is the dominant economic system in the world today that reinforces that hierarchy. The problem is social hierarchy. If only there was an economic system that seeks to abolish hierarchy. Oh well, guess we’ll keep looking…
- The problem is social hierarchy. If only there was an economic system that seeks to abolish hierarchy.
  Lol one wonders why this system has never been implemented. Oh it's because it needs complete centralization of the economy.
Most have a history, yes.
But the slavery with nestle is still going on.

And Mars, and Hershey

Wait til you learn where much of organic bat guano fertilizer is sourced.

Slavery predates capitalism by about as long as tribes predate capitalism.

You say that with some kind of implication of acceptism...
- I say that because slavery has nothing to do with capitalism and never has.