We count both small and medium-sized enterprises and some of the largest and most influential chocolate companies (manufacturers, processors and traders) among our members, as well as civil society organisations, certifiers and farmer organisations. Key international organisations such as the OHCHR, ILO and UNICEF act as Board advisors, and we also work very closely with the governments of cocoa-producing countries and at the regional level, such as the European Union. We believe that finding solutions to child labour and forced labour risk is a shared responsibility and requires collective action. Thanks to our multi-stakeholder structure, and our recognised influence, both as a technical expert and as a convener, we are optimally placed to bring about change across the whole cocoa sector.
ICI has been working in cocoa-growing communities in Côte d’Ivoire and Ghana for almost 15 years and within that time has helped advance quantified progress in the fight against child labour in cocoa. Between 2015 and 2020, our direct actions alone have improved child protection for more than 420,000 children and our approaches have led to a 20% reduction in child labour in ICI-assisted communities, as well as a 50% reduction in hazardous child labour amongst at-risk children identified by ICI’s monitoring systems.
