Together, you helped us buy a whopping 17,690 MT of cocoa beans via Tony’s Open Chain, our collaborative sourcing initiative. Here’s *exactly* what that means..
you paid 20,296 farmers a price that enables them to earn a living income
That’s 2,556 more than last year! All 20,296 benefit from Tony’s Sourcing Principles, which are designed to tackle the root cause of exploitation in cocoa – poverty. And it all starts with paying farmers the Living Income Reference Price (LIRP) long-term to enable them to earn a living income.
In 2023/24, we paid 44% above the main crop farmgate price set by the government in Côte d’Ivoire and 18% above the main farmgate price in Ghana. While this means farmers supplying to Tony’s Open Chain earn more than the average cocoa farmer in these two countries, enabling them to earn a living income relies heavily on the industry adopting our sourcing model. That’s how more farmers can sell more beans at this price for the long term.
The bitter truth about chocolate? It’s riddled with child labor.. As you’re reading this, about 1.56 million children* are engaged in child labor in Ghana + Côte d’Ivoire. Tony’s exists to change that. By tracing all our cocoa from bean to bar, we know where it comes from, which is crucial for identifying and remediating child labor cases on cocoa farms.
*NORC report, 2020
At our longest-term partner co-ops, child labor rates have stayed below 5% for 5 years running, and fell from 4.4% to 3.9% in the last 12 months. That shows the importance of long-term commitments, which is why we work with farmers for at least 5 years. ’Cause the longer we collaborate with co-ops, the more we see child labor go down.
Though Tony’s is making important strides to lower the prevalence of child labor, it is unfortunately not realiztic to expect the elimination of exploitation in the cocoa supply chain until we cover a much larger piece of the pie/chunk of the market. That’s why we invite all other chocolate brands to source their cocoa via Tony’s Open Chain, according to Tony’s Sourcing Principles.
Because it’s only together that we can fight exploitation in cocoa – bar by bar, bite by bite.
Tastes sweet, eh?! This means that in 2023/24, 99.95% of Tony’s Open Chain’s supply chain was verified deforestation-free. While we’re working hard to resolve the last 0.05% (= 14 farms), we are super proud of this achievement as it reinforces our commitment to protecting forests in West Africa.
Here’s to making lots (and lots) more impact this year as we keep growing our movement for change! Because together, we can break the mold and fight exploitation in cocoa. Bar by bar. Bite by bite.
