One of the world’s top cocoa processors has told a Brazilian court investigating child and slave labor it cannot trace its supplies, contradicting its own public statements and raising fears exploitation may be going unchecked.
Olam International is one of three food companies being sued by Brazilian state prosecutors for allegedly failing to address labor abuses in their supply chains.
The company denies the charges, which stem from a 2018 report by Brazil’s Federal Labor Prosecution Office and the International Labor Organization that showed widespread use of child and slave labor in Brazil’s cocoa industry.
But in its statement to the court in April, Olam’s lawyers said cocoa beans that were passed from farmer to middle man before being bought by the company were “not liable to tracking”.