Chocolate Research Paper

WOMEN STUDIES ECO-FOOTPRINT PROJECT Topic deep brown Beans Production Process umber is a mainstay ingredient in m either foods such as milk shakes, butt jointdy bars, cookies and cereals. It is ranked as sensation of the most favourite flavours in North the States and Europe. patronage its popularity most people do non know the unique origin of this popular treat. Chocolate is a product that requires complex procedures to produce. The military service involves draw-festival burnt umber, refining coca to hot chocolate beans, and shipping the deep brown beans to the manufacturing factory for cleaning, coaching and grinding.These chocolate beans depart and and so be imported or exported to opposite countries and be transformed into varied types of chocolate products. Cocoa beans induce in countries like Cote dIvoire, Ghana, Ind 1sia, Brazil, Nigeria, Cameroon, and Malaysia, but the highest cocoa producing state is Cote dIvoire. The merchandise process of cocoa b eans include first, cocoa is harvested manu anyy. The seed pods of cocoa argon collected and the beans be selected and placed in piles. These cocoa beans ar then ready to be shipped to the manufacturer for production.Cocoa grows in pods that germinate off the t huntks and branches of cocoa trees. The pods put up the class and almost the size of football. The pods start out thou and turn orange when they are undecomposed. When the pods are ripe they are harvested gently with machetes. Machines can damage the trees or the clusters of flowers and pods that grow on the trunk, so lenders throw away to harvest the pods by hand, using short, hooked blades mounted on long poles to reach the highest fruit. The cocoa seeds then permit a process of fermentation by placing them in magnanimous, shallow, heated trays or by c all overing them with large banana leaves.If the climate is castigate, they whitethorn be only heated by the lie. Workers mostly women come along periodically and stir them up so that all of the beans come out equally fermented. This process may take up to five or eight-spot days. After fermentation, the cocoa seeds are dried in front they can be scooped into sacks and shipped to chocolate manufacturers. Farmers simply go around the fermented seeds on trays and leave them in the sun to dry. The drying process usually takes almost a week and results in seeds becoming reduced to near half of their original weight.During the production process, labor is not equally dual-lane between men and women who course in the planation this brings us to the issue of gender division. The gender divide that exists on the cocoa plantation is that most farm work is conducted by men, although most certainly thither are tasks where women are real active, such as scooping the beans from the already opened husks, turning the beans during the fermentation and drying process, and sewing the jute sacs infallible for the packaging of the dried beans. Wom en in the farms normally execute to the needs of the family.When female labor is hired during the harvest-home time the wages given to them are not the same as those for men. Perhaps another reason out why men are preferred is because of their untrue higher productivity rate compared to that of women. repayable to variant practices followed in individual regions, even within countries, the enfolding of women and their assigned tasks vary enormously. For instance, because of the popular method of sun drying cocoa beans in Ecuador, it is necessary to clean the beans. This argumentation is mostly beneathtaken by women.This is not the case in Ghana or Brazil where sun drying is realized while protecting the beans from foreign matters and waste. It is interesting to air however that there is no specific approach pattern for the assignment of tasks to women, except during the harvest when the scooping of the beans from the opened pods is principally performed by women in most cocoa producing countries. disposed(p) the great differences in the systems of production in producing countries it is backbreaking to contract a common percentage that reflects the number participation of the female work force.It is worth mentioning that impertinent the coffee rustic empyrean, there are no associations or specific groups that house women only composite in the cocoa sector at any level, although all associations and cooperatives are open to all who qualify. Due to fluctuation of cocoa prices in the world market, farmers have no long-term security, and in some situations, they do not have enough bullion to realize their realm traffic.Cocoa farmers are always faced with financial hardship they are not able to depart for their families as they would want nor have enough funds to start up their own farming business because they only receive a fraction of the reward from the selling of the beans on the world market and there are many an(prenominal) peopl e in the business chain. Cocoa farmers around the world face many challenges. It is estimated that about one-third of global cocoa crops are destroyed by pests and diseases every year. Many cocoa farmers have limited advance to the latest agricultural technologies or methods of cultivation and hardly a(prenominal) of them ave business backgrounds to help them effectively market their products and manage their operations. Many of the farming communities live in poverty and are infect with diseases. Industry groups, politicss and consumers worldwide have raised concerns about the use of pesticides and electric razor labor on westward African cocoa farms. An interview conducted by Christophe Koffi showed that one major problem that women in cocoa production encounter is the lack the of financial capability or backing due to the fact that most of these women find themselves in a male predominate occupation.It is very difficult for them to secure financial aid or loans to manage their farms. For instance, Women cannot inherit or even create a cocoa plantation under our patriarch-dominated tradition, utter Vanie, criticising what she called a backwards and misogynist practice (Koffi, 2008) because we thus far live in a patriarchal dominated society where women do not have the right to own lands and properties. This paper elevate talks about the sustanability in the production process of cocoa.We will be looking at Lindt& Sprunglis which is a family caller-out and a major producer of chocolate and other cocoa products with a headquaters in Kilchberg, Switzerland. Lindt & Sprungli is one of the few chocolate makers that have complete control over every step of the production chain offset with the precise selection of the finest cocoa varieties from the best accomplishmentation areas in the world right on done the business organisationful and expert processing until ending with the urbane packaging.Lindt gets its cocoa beans mostly from Ghana and Cen tral and federation America. Lindt has been very conservative in the amount of slide fastener its invests in the chocolate production process. Each alert and future facility and investment undergoes very circumstantial analysis to determine how much nil can be saved. Through better insulation and life force recovery, Lindt & Sprungli was able to cut down on zip fastener consumption by more than 13% per ton produced between 2004 and 2010.The company intends to continue reducing the energy consumption rate per ton produced by an honest over the coming years. According to the Lindt publication, The companys efforts since 1999, Lindt & Sprunglis Swiss subsidiary, Chocoladefabriken Lindt & Sprungli (Schweiz) AG, has been an active member of the Lake Zurich muscle Model GroupThe Swiss government and strong-minded engineers have audited the progress and as a result, the Swiss subsidiary has been granted the official certificate. Kilchberg, 2012) Since 2007, Lindt & Sprungli unde r urine conservation has been participating in the Carbon divine revelation Project (CDP)Since then, the measurements of water emissions and energy consumption have been largely based on the concept of the methodological analysis Fossil Fuels set out in the CDP protocolWaste water, Lindt & Sprungli continuously monitors and analyses the use of water and the return of wastewater in the production process and intends to further reduce the use of fresh water in this process, which, in turn will impact the output of wastewater (Kilchberg, 2012) The major people that benefit from cocoa production are mostly the giant corporations. The corporations exploit cocoa farmers in the sense that they do not pay them the true worth of their trade union movement. Women who work on the farms are underpaid and marginalized. There is also the issue of shaver labor where children of school button age are forced to work on the farms instead of going to school thereby denying them the right to ed ucation. The big corporations are not forth coming in cathartic information as to how and where they get their cocoa beans from.Most of these African countries where these big corporations get their raw materials from do not have access to good roads, health care facilities, schools, electricity, and there is poverty in most of the communities. These big corporations buy the cocoa beans at a very garish rate and then import them to the westward society and the refined product is processed into different kinds of chocolates (e. g. chocolate drink, chocolate bars of different shapes and sizes and chocolate candies etc. ) which are sold consumers at usurious prices considering the price at which the cocoa beans are bought from the cocoa farmers. This explains how capitalism and big corporation exploit cheap labour. Almost everyone enjoys a bit of chocolate every now and again. But if you take a ambient look at how cocoa is produced, it may tumesce leave a bitter taste in your mou th.The conditions under which the cocoa farmers in many producer countries live and work are worrying Despite the fact that cocoa is usually their main offset of income, the families struggle to make a living from it. shaver labour is not uncommon. As consumers we can work with NGOs to find means of helping the farmers to adapt to unseasoned systems of cocoa farming that result higher yields, under socially more acceptable and environmentally affable conditions, to meet market demands and hence ensure a stable flow income. As a major part of the global cocoa industry which has remained passive and invisible for so long, consumers of chocolate can expose that they want slavery in the cocoa sector stamped out, and your pressure can highlight their lack of trueness and make them more accountable.Finally all cocoa products, including chocolate, run the risk of being tainted by child labour and slavery. To achieve a satisfactory bar of ethical production in chocolate consumers e ssential help to ensure that companies commit to credible and competent actions against such things as use of child labour and the exploitation of cocoa farmers and not make rancid and unsustainable promises to consumers of being slavery- free. The consumers can liaise with government bodies and NGOs to negotiate fair prices for the purchase of cocoa products and this will in turn help the farmers to gain access to basic social amenities of life. Reference paginate genus Sagittarius, D. (2012).ADMs commitment to sustainable cocoa. Milwaukee Copyright 2012 Archer Daniels Midland Company . Clarkson, T. (1998). Anti-slavery. Retrieved November 15, 2012, from www. antislavery. org http//www. antislavery. org/english/privacy_policy. aspx Kilchberg. (2012, April 22). The environment in the Production Process. Retrieved November 13, 2012, from www. Lindt. com http//www. lindt. com/swf/eng/company/social-responsibility/lindts-sustainable-cocoa-supply-chain/ Koffi, C. (2008, November 7). Ivory Coast women contain taboos. Retrieved November 11, 2012, from iol News http//www. iol. co. za/news/africa/ivory-coast-women-defy-taboos-1. 423405