Just in time for Halloween, North America’s largest chocolate producer, The Hershey Company, announced plans to source 100 percent of its chocolate from sustainable cocoa production.  Most of that chocolate will come from West Africa, a region wracked by coups and conflict since receiving independence in the 1960s. West Africa, in fact, produces 70 percent of the world’s chocolate.

Hershey’s announcement means it will hold its suppliers to recognized standards for environmental, labor and better farming practices, according to various certification schemes.

When I heard the news, I couldn’t help but wonder if a chocolate bar would one day prevent kids like Ishmael Beah, the former child solider from Sierra Leone who penned the gripping autobiography, Long Way Gone: Memoirs of a Child Solider, from ever becoming child soldiers.

I had the honor of introducing Ishmael Beah at a Young Presidents’ Organization (YPO)  event last month on sub-Saharan Africa. CEOs from across New England gathered to discuss The Hopeful Continent: Africa Rising, as The Economist Magazine put it recently.

Now when you think of Sierra Leone, you probably associate it with the diamond industry, and Leonardo Di Caprio, who starred a smuggler in the film Blood Diamond.

Or you might remember that back in April, the International Criminal Court in The Hague found the former Liberian president Charles Taylor guilty of war crimes for his role in masterminding the bloody civil war in Sierra Leone–fought over its diamonds–which left 50,000 dead and countless more as refugees.

Here’s the interesting thing. Before the war, and especially today, the industry that matters most in Sierra Leone is not diamonds but cocoa. That’s right. Cocoa is historically Sierra Leone’s most important cash crop.

Yet, during the war, cocoa farmers, forced into hiding, abandoned their farms – which returned to wild jungles – and cocoa production plummeted across the country.

After the war, those same farmers with nothing else left banded together to reclaim their land. With support from development agencies, private businesses and sustainable certifiers, farmer organizations emerged to rebuild the cocoa industry, rehabilitate farmers’ land, and begin their lives anew.

Today, cocoa production in Sierra Leone is on the rise. And my organization, Root Capital, is financing two fair trade certified, organic cocoa enterprises, Kpeya Agricultural Enterprise and Balmed Holdings, both of which are breathing new life into the shattered countryside of Sierra Leone. And here’s the kicker. They’re both located in the eastern part of the country in the heart of the diamond fields where the worst violence took place.

But the most exciting thing perhaps about the rebirth of cocoa farming in Sierra Leone is how it’s offering hope and employment for youth – many of whom were child soldiers who grew up, put down their guns, but needed another option.

Agriculture can be that viable option. In fact, it’s perhaps the best way to help former famers and their families to rebuild lives with dignity—especially when they have access to buyers of sustainable cocoa, like the Hershey Company will be by 2020.  Farmers’ incomes increase when they tap into premium-priced global markets based on quality, traceability, transparency, and sustainability. Those farmers, in turn, help to spur local rural economies, via the multiplier effect, as they tend to spend the majority of their income on local goods and services.

Until recently, buyers of sustainably produced chocolate were smaller, largely European companies.

But now companies like Hershey are recognizing that they must change the way they approach the global procurement of raw materials in order to remain competitive. Leading actors are making the investments needed to forge value chains that, not only promote sustainable farmer livelihoods, but are resilient in the face of shocks from increasingly unpredictable weather, higher food costs, and wild swings in currency, energy and commodity prices. This approach can reduce costs, lower risk, and create tangible examples of sustainability throughout the value chain.

While diamonds were part of West Africa’s demise, we at Root Capital are putting our money on sustainable cocoa to be part of its renaissance. So have a Happy Halloween and here’s to Hershey making good on its commitment – and catalyzing sustainable cocoa harvests across West Africa.

To see another example of how small and growing agricultural business can promote peace and prosperity, watch this short clip about our clients in Rwanda:

Source: Forbes 

Photo © Los Angeles Post