With the World Cocoa Conference 2016 just a week away, the International Cocoa Initiative (ICI) and UTZ are extending their invitation to a joint event uniting key stakeholders in the fight against child labour in cocoa. Representatives from government, industry, civil society, and farmer cooperatives will discuss one emerging and innovative model for child labour prevention and response, ICI’s child labour monitoring and remediation system (CLMRS).
Held on Tuesday 24 May at 17:00, as a side event at the World Cocoa Conference, the discussion will aim to inform its audience about an approach that has proven results at a relatively small scale, and to provoke a discussion about what may be needed for greater impact at a larger scale.
The CLMRS approach, crafted by ICI and so far implemented jointly with Nestlé, allows companies to identify and address cases of child labour in their supply-chains and develop tailored responses. In 2015, for example, the ICI/Nestlé’s CLMRS found out that that 90% of the children involved in hazardous activities in the monitored cooperatives were carrying heavy loads. This should allow the cocoa industry to better target its awareness raising messages to this specific risk and adapt its remediation and prevention strategies accordingly, for instance by providing wheelbarrows to farmers.
At the event, participants will get a chance to hear more about ICI’s approach, the inclusion of its principles in the UTZ Code, the ICI/UTZ collaboration to further evolve the model, as well as efforts underway also to learn from others and collectively define emerging good practices. Stakeholders attending the World Cocoa Conference in the Dominican Republic, please join us in room Punta Cana at the World Cocoa Conference venue on Tuesday, May 24 from 17:00 until 19:30. For more information, or to register, please contact media@cocoainitiative.org.