The event was opened by the Chairs of the three European Platforms, Filippo Veglio from our Swiss Platform for Sustainable Cocoa (SWISSCO), Wolf Kropp-Büttner for the Forum Nachhaltiger Kakao (GISCO, Germany) and Philippe de Selliers from Beyond Chocolate (Belgium). They welcomed the more than 100 participants and especially Didier Reynders, European Commissioner for Justice, who presented an outline of the developments on a possible Human Rights and Environmental Due Diligence Regulation at EU level and the EU Multi-Stakeholder Dialogue for Sustainable Cocoa in the introductory part.
From the Swiss side, Filippo Veglio shared a brief overview around the developments on human rights and environmental due diligence in Switzerland, providing insights into the ongoing democratic debate around the Responsible Business Initiative, which will be decided by a popular vote on November 29. Emphasizing SWISSCO’s impartiality with regard to the vote, Filippo underlined the Platform’s commitment to enhancing the social, environmental and economic sustainability of the cocoa value chain, which includes the encouragement of its members to implement the UN Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights on a cross-sectoral level. As part of its six Principles for Sustainable Cocoa production, SWISSCO positions the promotion of decent living conditions and the contribution to a living income for cocoa farmers and their families as well as the prevention of the worst forms of child labor. A full transcript of this speech can be accessed here.
Another special welcome was addressed to Mr. Emmanuel Opoku from the Ghana Cocoa Board as representative from a producing country, participating to the panel discussion on how to design effective cooperation implementing human rights due diligence. The panelists represented actors along the cocoa value chain, from the producing country, to a trader, a chocolate producer, a retailer and a standard setting organization, all sharing their views and approaches.
In four thematic breakout sessions members further discussed roles and responsibilities and exchanged on ways and possible tools for collaboration. Overall, the participants concluded and agreed that all actors have a role to play, from governments in consuming and producing countries to allow for a level playing field and an enabling environment, along the actors of the value chain to the end consumer, and it is through collaborative action only that we can achieve human rights due diligence in the cocoa value chain.
SWISSCO underscores the importance of continuing to share knowledge and experiences around best practice across the stakeholder groups, so that we accelerate the transition to a viable and resilient cocoa value chain, for both present and future generations.