Child Labour in Bangladesh 02#https://youtu.be/1nato0Pfgxk
In 1998, UNICEF reported that Ivory Coast farmers used enslaved children – many from surrounding countries.[138] In late 2000 a BBC documentary reported the use of enslaved children in the production of cocoa—the main ingredient in chocolate[139]— in West Africa.[140][141] Other media followed by reporting widespread child slavery and child trafficking in the production of cocoa.[138][142][143] In 2001, the US State Department estimated there were 15,000 child slaves cocoa, cotton and coffee farms in the Ivory Coast,[144] and the Chocolate Manufacturers Association acknowledged that child slavery is used in the cocoa harvest.[144][not in citation given][better source needed]
Malian migrants have long worked on cocoa farms in the Ivory Coast, but in 2000 cocoa prices had dropped to a 10-year low and some farmers stopped paying their employees.[145] The Malian counsel had to rescue some boys who had not been paid for five years and who were beaten if they tried to run away.[145] Malian officials believed that 15,000 children, some as young as 11 years old, were working in the Ivory Coast in 2001. These children were often from poor families or the slums and were sold to work in other countries.[142] Parents were told the children would find work and send money home, but once the children left home, they often worked in conditions resembling slavery.[140] In other cases, children begging for food were lured from bus stations and sold as slaves.[146] In 2002, the Ivory Coast had 12,000 children with no relatives nearby, which suggested they were trafficked,[140] likely from neighboring Mali, Burkina Faso and Togo.[147]
The cocoa industry was accused of profiting from child slavery and trafficking.[148] The European Cocoa Association dismissed these accusations as "false and excessive"[148] and the industry said the reports were not representative of all areas.[149] Later the industry acknowledged the working conditions for children were unsatisfactory and children's rights were sometimes violated[150] and acknowledged the claims could not be ignored. In a BBC interview, the ambassador for Ivory Coast to the United Kingdom called these reports of widespread use of slave child labour by 700,000 cocoa farmers as absurd and inaccurate.[149]
In 2001, a voluntary agreement called the Harkin-Engel Protocol, was accepted by the international cocoa and chocolate industry to eliminate the worst forms of child labour, as defined by ILO's Convention 182, in West Africa.[151] This agreement created a foundation named International Cocoa Initiative in 2002. The foundation claims it has, as of 2011, active programs in 290 cocoa growing communities in Côte d'Ivoire and Ghana, reaching a total population of 689,000 people to help eliminate the worst forms of child labour in cocoa industry.[152] Other organisations claim progress has been made, but the protocol's 2005 deadlines have not yet been met