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213 comments on The Limits of Biofuels

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kvenlander on May 9, 2006 - 4:14pm Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top
I remember that story. Please thank your friend for a job well done. Unfortunately it is all too easy to close your mind on the implications of stories like that. The cognitive dissonance between "I'm a good person" / "I am funding slavery" is too painful.

I don't know if there is a solution except to keep plugging away. Is the story online somewhere?

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Leanan on May 9, 2006 - 6:19pm Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top
There are now many web pages devoted to the topic.  There's even a Wikipedia entry:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chocolate_and_slavery

But the average American doesn't even know...or care.  There seems to be more concern in Europe, where apparently some people are making an effort to by "free trade" chocolate...enough for it to be a marketing point.  

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fleam on May 10, 2006 - 1:30am Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top
I'm fairly well informed and have never heard of this issue. It's a total non-issue in the US and not likely to ever become an issue (unless the slave folks get nukes). I had a chocolate bar this morning and some nice tirimisu earlier this evening, and would probably have another chocolate bar now but I'm saving that one for tomorrow. They (the chocolate bars) say "made in Belgium" see no mention of starving children or of Africa. If I were a typical American and thought about it at all I'd have visions of nice well-fed Belgians with good medical plans tending to the cocoa trees growing in the Belgian cold and wind.

Everything in Starbucks doesn't have chocolate in it, but almost everything does. In fact, I'm not much of a chocolate eater (these 3 little chocolate bars I got at trader joe's are 3 of maybe 6 a year I eat), but overall Americans are chocoholics.

And this issue is utterly unknown in the US.

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smekhovo on May 10, 2006 - 3:59am Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top
If the perpetrators of these crimes were Muslims, we would be hearing a lot more about them.
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tappel on May 10, 2006 - 12:07pm Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top
The fair trade movement is actually pretty big in Europe, although fair trade chocolate is not as widely available as fair trade coffee and various kinds of fruit. I, as well as many of my friends, only buy bananas if they are fair trade.

The growth of the movement is one of the very few really encouraging developments in the recent years.

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