<\/p>\n
I’ve seen artikkler<\/strong> (articles) about\u00a0barn<\/strong> (children) and vest-afrikanske kakaog\u00e5rder<\/strong> (West-African cocoa farms)\u00a0in norske aviser<\/strong> (Norwegian newspapers) lately.\u00a0 I think I wrote a post a while back about norsk sjokolade<\/strong> (Norwegian chocolate) and how delicious it is.\u00a0 When I was a student in Oslo, my friends and I went to\u00a0Freia sjokoladefabrikken<\/strong> (the Freia Chocolate Factory) and ate so much delicious sjokolade<\/strong>, we thought we were going to spy<\/strong> (puke).\u00a0 Little did I know then when I was shoving D’aim, Firkl\u00f8ver, og Kvikklunsj<\/em> (kinds of norsk sjokoladeprodukter<\/strong>) that there is concern about where the sjokolade<\/strong> comes from.<\/p>\n Apparently, the majority of norsk sjokolade<\/strong>\u00a0is produced\u00a0from kakao<\/strong> from kakaog\u00e5rd<\/strong>\u00a0in vestlige Afrika<\/strong>.\u00a0 Elfenbenkysten<\/strong> (The Ivory Coast) is a great example of a West-African country that is absolutely full of kakaog\u00e5rder.\u00a0 <\/strong>To give you a better picture, Elfenbenkysten<\/strong> produces 40 % of the world’s kakaoproduksjon; <\/strong>there are about 600,000 kakaobonder<\/strong> there, many of whom are unge barn<\/strong> (young) children.<\/p>\n What a lot of\u00a0nordmenn<\/strong> and anyone eating sjokolade, of which they don’t know the origins,\u00a0don’t think about when they are savoring sjokolade<\/strong> is the fact that a starving, battered, young African slave might have worked a 12 hour day to harvest the cocoa to make your treat.\u00a0 Me-guilty.\u00a0 Not that kakao<\/strong> is the only product involved in barnearbeid<\/strong>(child labor) and slaveri<\/strong> (slavery), but for some reason knowing that sjokolade<\/strong>, such a succulent, delicious treat loved by nearly all taste buds, a treat that makes so many people happy, could be a source of such sadness and hopelessness for those on the other end.<\/p>\n Many of the children were given away by their parents because they couldn’t afford to raise them.\u00a0 Many were stolen from their families.\u00a0 They are fed sometimes en gang om dagen<\/strong> (once per day) and forced to work umenneskelig lange arbeidsdager<\/strong> (inhumane long\u00a0work days)\u00a0in horrible conditions.\u00a0 De g\u00e5r ikke p\u00e5 skole<\/strong> (they don’t go to school) and some don’t even speak lokalspr\u00e5ket<\/strong> (the local language).\u00a0 All so we can eat sjokolade<\/strong>.<\/p>\n So what can we really do about this besides not eat anything with kakao<\/strong> in it?\u00a0 According to Dag Kjetil \u00d8yna<\/em> of Norsk Sjokolade fabrikkersforening<\/strong>, we need to work on improving forholder <\/strong>(conditions) in vestlige Afrika<\/strong>.\u00a0 Bedrifter<\/strong> (Companies) involved in sjokoladeproduksjon<\/strong> must work with governmental and food authorities, as well as non-profit organizations to create better working and living conditions in the area.<\/p>\n