Ivory Coast- The politics of Chocolate
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I answered a tweet this afternoon (26/1/11) from the BBC about the proposed Cocoa sanctions in the Ivory coast and before I knew I had an invitation to appear on a BBC Radio programme called AFRICA HAVE YOUR SAY to discuss my points of view on this issue.
For those that may not know what is going on over in Ivory Coast there was an election in November and the incumbent president lost but refused to go. In a nutshell there is an impasse
the International community has recognised Alassane Ouattara as the rightful President of Ivory Coast and to that end he has called for a month-long ban on cocoa exports which amongst others America backs
My problem with this is 2 fold
1. This type of sanction will only hurt the farmers and not the big guys they have access to resources some of which maybe hidden in Swiss accounts for all I know- the farmers only want to sell their cocoa to pay for food, healthcare and sent their children to school. You know the sort of things you and I aspire to…
2. The farmers who were already getting a raw deal will get an even worse deal as folk from neighbouring countries move in smuggle the cocoa out. These farmers will be anxious to sell just so they can put food on the table.
Questions
What will this mean for those that carry the FAIRTRADE label?
Will they be able to distinguish cocoa from Ivory coast against that which is from Ghana for instance or ethical sources for that matter?
What about you the consumer?
Do you mind that your chocolate is made of cocoa from an illegitimate regime?
Or would you prefer to support the growers anyway?
What about Alassane Ouattara, how much does he really care about his people?
Should the West butt out and leave the Ivorians /Africans to resolve this?
I have kept this short so we can have a debate so over to you folk
About IdaHornerFounder of Ethnic Supplies a social enterprise working to alleviate poverty amongst East African women involved in textile and handicraft production. Managing Editor of Africa on the blog
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4 Responses to Ivory Coast- The politics of Chocolate
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I had no prior knowledge on this but following the link you provided Ida it seems that
1) The the worry of the cocoa buyers is nothing to do with the rights and wrongs of the situation or the legalities it’s purely over whether they’ll end up losing their cocoa licences…
2) The USA, along with several other African countries, is presumably batting a position that best serves its own agenda, whatever that might be
3) I guess Mr Ouattara wants to use the quickest most effective route to secure power
And the upshot would appear that none give a toss about the plight of the cocoa farmers, FAIRTRADE or anything but their own necks. Now why is it that, if that’s true, it doesn’t surprise me?
Still, the more places the issue gets an airing the more ordinary people will hear of it and, hopefully make their views known.
Twitter: Linda_Mattacks
I wonder if they use the sanctions to try and motivate the farmers into pushing Mr Outtara out of office? I find that this is quite disturbing that the sanctions can cause civil unrest and screw any kind of tourism in the area for the next few years as well
It’s a tough situation but could it be dealt with internally or just using the African Union?
Linda and Sarah as far as I understand the situation, having won the elections Mr Ouattara wants to use these sanctions to cut off financing to the Laurent Gbagbo regime and as such force him out of power. Unfortunately the only one that will get hurt by this are the peasant farmers who who no clout at all and are only interested in selling their cocoa.
The African Union is toothless and neither party will take any notice of them, they International community have their own agenda that may not necessarily serve the Ivorians. If it was up to me I would elect an interim government to run the country for a whole year and send the political parties back to the electorate to sweat it again again. That said who is to say that we would not end up in the same situation a year later!
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