This project seeks to improve child labour risk-management by Ivorian cocoa cooperatives through the development, testing and deployment of a child labour risk model.
Combatting child labour at the national level requires involving all cocoa cooperatives in the process of child labour risk identification. Due to certification requirements and rapidly evolving regulations in business and human rights, cooperatives are increasingly asked to identify and manage such risks, but they often lack the time, resources and capacity to do so. The risk model developed through this project is based on nine simple indicators related to farming households and farm characteristics, such as the age and sex of children, the farmer’s level of formal education or the size of the farm. Many of these indicators are already collected by cooperatives for management or commercial purposes, while some cooperatives will need training and support to collect this data. With this easy-to-use tool, cocoa cooperatives will be able to extract a list of communities and households within their membership and identify those most at risk of child labour. Interventions and remediation can then be targeted at those most at need of assistance to prevent child labour within their operations.
