The Ivory Coast-Ghana Cocoa Initiative (CIGCI), established to ensure a minimum income to farmers, and the national cocoa management bodies of the two nations "noted the efforts made by some companies and their willingness to find solutions together for a sustainable production of cocoa that places producers at the heart of this strategy."
They "encourage all manufacturers to take action and show that they sincerely believe in sustainable cocoa production".
For a number of weeks, Côte d'Ivoire and Ghana criticized the chocolate producers for failing to pay the decent income differential (DRD), a 400 dollar (or 390 euro) per ton premium set in 2019 to guarantee farmers a good wage.
They had threatened to "ban access to plantations to make crop forecasts" and "suspend sustainability programs" if the industry did not fulfill its commitments by November 20.
These initiatives, which attempt to combat deforestation and child labor, provide manufacturers the right to claim that their chocolate is sustainably produced, which is a standard that many customers value.
However, on Monday, the producing nations declared that they would keep up the conversation and form "a working group of experts" to make suggestions by the end of the first quarter of 2023.
Ivorian Prime Minister Patrick Achi expressed optimism that a "intelligent compromise" will be reached when questioned about the situation during a press conference.
"The solution is to process 100% of our cocoa" in Côte d'Ivoire,
he continued. Currently, about a quarter of Ivorian cocoa is processed locally.
In Ivory Coast, where there are around 27 million people, cocoa accounts for 45% of the world's production, 14% of the GDP, and 24% of the country's food supply.
Additionally, Côte d'Ivoire is regarded as a significant regional location for the trafficking of children from nearby nations to labor on its crops.
On less than a dollar a day, many farm families still experience chronic poverty, which is one of the things that leads to child labor on cocoa farms.
Matthias Lange, executive director of the International Cocoa Initiative (ICI), a Swiss organisation established by the chocolate industry to combat child slavery, claims that
"a lot of progress has been made."
The creation of the Child Labor Monitoring and Remediation System was lauded by Mr. Lange. He said
"a mechanism that has reduced child labor by 35% in three years and has helped remove several tens of thousands of children from the plantations,"