On my way to an Amnesty International meeting last week, I grumbled at pictures of Valentine's Day specials in the Philadelphia Weekly, reminders of a sugarfest that would lob chocolate from all directions into my reluctant but secretly happy mouth.
Hershey's, Nestle Milk and - oh, YUM! - Cadbury eggs . one after another I blocked images from my brain. I arrived at the meeting and picked up a weekly presentation sheet. Guess what it was about?
Chocolate.
On Jan. 8, Charles Piller reported for The Seattle Times that the Gates Foundation held investments worth $189 million in the following chocolate-makers: Archer Daniels Midland, Nestle, Cadbury Schweppes and Kraft.
These firms buy cocoa from West Africa, where 70 percent of cocoa is produced. In 2002, the U.S. Agency for International Development reported that 284,000 children in West Africa, many under 14 years of age, worked under brutal conditions on cocoa plantations. Two hundred thousand are concentrated in operations on the Ivory Coast.
These companies have great PR. They publicly support sustainable cocoa farming and participate in groups like the International Cocoa Initiative to keep production environmentally safe and free of child labor.
This token support is not enough. Piller reports U.S. State Department findings that countless numbers of children continue to be trafficked to the Ivory Coast, working for 10-20 hours per day under hazardous conditions and sleeping in confinement.
There are many other current concerns about the cocoa industry, including controversy over fair-market prices and fair-trade sustainability. But for me, the show stops at the word "children."
When I think of chocolate, I think of happy, healthy children chomping away to glory.
I was one of them. I used to love Valentine's Day solely because of all the chocolate involved.
I still get excited about chocolate. But I don't want any old chocolate. Men of Penn, prospective V-day suitors, this chick eats fair trade. And yes, I've found out where you can buy it for me.
I got on the line with Rodney North, board director of the for-profit fair-trade company, Equal Exchange. Founded in 1986, it is the oldest and largest company of its kind in the United States.
Equal Exchange has a special presence in Philadelphia. Their chocolates are conveniently found in places where you can go with friends for their delicious fair-trade coffee as well, such as Joe's Coffee Bar, Infusion Coffee and Tea, and Greenline Coffee and Tea (right here on Locust!). Their chocolate is also found at stores that carry other fair-trade products, such as Ten Thousand Villages, The Black Cat and Whole Foods.
If you're looking for Godiva-style high-end gifts, Williams-Sonoma also carries a premium fair-trade brand, Jubilee Chocolates, and if you're looking for internationally famous brands, the Britain-born Divine Chocolate is carried at Joe's Coffee Bar, The Black Cat and Mariposa's Food Co-op.
There's a very personal connection between some of the abovementioned chocolate carriers and the fair-trade cause.
Joseph Cesa, owner of Joe's Coffee Bar, is part of the Independents Coffee Cooperative. This is a group of coffee houses in the area that sacrifice a chunk of their profit margin to offer top quality fair trade goods in their business.
Joe's commitment to ethical profits is touching, as are his stories of visiting plantations and describing children he saw there as "little hovels."
The Coffee Cooperative doesn't mind taking risks. They're testing Equal Exchange's chocolate sauce among their stores to help the product become sellable for mainstream markets. Joe describes Philadelphia's much-loved White Dog Cafe as having a similar commitment. Cafe owner Judy Wicks insists on Sweet Earth Organic's chocolate in the desserts even though, as Joe says, "it doesn't behave like commercial chocolate."
It's true that fair-trade cocoa isn't fully usable for all commercial chocolates, such as truffles. But, as Joe said, "If people demand change, the quality can improve."
The quality Joe refers to is that of the cocoa-based ingredients shipped from fair-trade companies, not chocolate bars themselves - the actual bars are delicious (I just tried Omanhene's) with a 70-percent cocoa content. Commercial bars' content hovers around 15 percent.
So this Valentine's Day, I look forward to breaking my no-sugar pact with a bang. Valentine's Day and always, buy chocolate, keeping in mind that children should be eating it, not producing it.
Arushi Sharma is an College junior from Rockville, Md. Her e-mail address is sharma@dailypennsylvanian.com. A Case of the Mondays appears on Mondays.
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