Guest post

Halloween should be fun, right? Unfortunately, a scary reality is that one of the biggest nights for the chocolate industry supports a system that relies on forced child labor on many West African cocoa farms. But you can do something to help stop such practices and still enjoy Halloween.

This October, families, organizations, and businesses across the U.S. can help children forced to work on West African cocoa farms by participating in the 5th annual Reverse Trick-or-Treating campaign. By handing out organic, Fair Trade chocolates from Equal Exchange with attached informational cards when they go trick-or-treating, participants can bring critically important attention to the thousands of children who are trafficked and forced to work in horrible conditions on West African cocoa farms.

This year’s Reverse Trick-or-Treating program marks the 10^th anniversary of the September, 2001, signing of the Harkin-Engel Protocol that called for an end to the worst forms of child labor in the cocoa supply chains of the major chocolate companies. The campaign to raise awareness that there is a Fair Trade alternative to child labor was launched in 2007, two years after the deadline had passed for signatories to end the worst forms of child labor. Ten years after the protocol’s signing, most of its conditions have still not been met.

Equal Exchange knows there’s a better way to go and instead sources its Fair Trade and organic cocoa from farms in the Dominican Republic, Panama, Peru, and Ecuador. The vanilla from Madagascar and sugar from Paraguay for Equal Exchange’s chocolate are also certified Fair Trade and organic.

Contributed by: Kelsie Evans, Equal Exchange Chocolate Products Coordinator

What’s even better than chocolate?

Free chocolate.

What’s even better than free chocolate?

Free, Fair Trade chocolate.

What’s even better than free, Fair Trade chocolate?

Free, Fair Trade chocolate for the good of others.

You’ve heard us chat up Reverse Trick-or-Treating in the past, but did you know that when you sign up to take part you get all the chocolates you need at no charge?

And we’re not talking ordinary Fair Trade chocolates (wait, is there such a thing?) we’re talking eco-yummy, ethically sourced chocolate from Coco-Zen, Alter Eco, and our own partner, Equal Exchange.

For more, go to www.reversetrickortreating.org (Please note the deadline.)

Add a comment below if you’re planning on taking part! We are!

Participate in the Third Annual Reverse Trick-or-Treating!

On Halloween night, schoolchildren, (& high school/college students, and adults) across the US and Canada will unite to help:

END poverty among cocoa farmers
END abusive child labor in the cocoa industry
PROMOTE Fair Trade
PROTECT the environment

by giving Fair Trade chocolate back to adults…while Trick-or-Treating door-to-door in their communities on Halloween.

The chocolate is attached to a card with information about social and environmental justice issues in the cocoa industry and how buying Fair Trade certified chocolate provides a solution.

Parents rave about how Reverse Trick-or-Treating transforms Halloween into a meaningful event when youth activists give back to their neighbors and to cocoa growing communities.

Reverse Trick-or-Treating kits are FREE
Thanks to the generous donations of Fair Trade chocolate companies
Equal Exchange, Alter Eco, Sweet Earth, and La Siembra (& others in Canada)
(Participants pay the cost of postage only.)

Participate as an individual or organize your classroom, school, congregation, youth group or social justice organization to participate by distributing multiple kits to participants!

DEADLINE TO REQUEST KITS:
Groups (schools, congregations, youth groups, etc):  October 1
Individuals:  October 13
Order yours TODAY!  We always run out long before the deadline!

Join us, and together, we will reach nearly
a quarter million households this year!

Visit www.reversetrickortreating.org for more information!

If you choose not to request a kit, you can still participate by distributing flyers on Halloween!  Visit the website for more information.

Looking for Fair Trade Halloween candy to distribute to kids at your door? Visit https://www.globalexchangestore.org/SearchResults.asp?Cat=263.

Are you a teacher or other educator (faith-based schools, etc, etc)?  Teach Global Exchange’s fabulous, fun, teaching standards-friendly Fair Trade curriculum anytime between now and Valentine’s Day, 2010, and you will be entered into a drawing for $75 in Fair Trade prizes.  More information is available at www.globalexchange.org/cocoa.

If you’re not an educator, please forward this email to some folks who are, and you’ll be entered into a Fair Trade prize drawing, too, for referring educators!

Reverse Trick-or-Treating is an initiative launched by the human rights organization Global Exchange in cooperation with Fair Trade company Equal Exchange and is a collaborative effort of countless children, youth, and adults supported by institutions including nonprofit organizations, faith-based organizations, Fair Trade companies, and schools.

Please forward this email broadly!  Plus, please pass the information along to your favorite parenting, environmental, and chocolate blogs.

PS:  Global Exchange’s Fair Trade cocoa curriculum is featured in Education for Liberation’s teacher planner for the second year in a row!  Copies of Planning to Change the World are available at http://cts.vresp.com/c/?EducationforLiberati/51cd00bd4f/5d87156170/727b3e6098

(Content from this post taken directly from Global Exchange’s e-blast. If information is missing or incorrect, please contact them directly.)