Thursday, April 06, 2006

Easter Eggs


The chocolate used in Easter eggs, is NOT fair-trade chocolate. Therefore you are not supporting the farmers that produce the cocoa beans that make your Easter especially yummy!

Chocolate used for Easter eggs is bought cheaply, but at a huge cost to our planet. Cocoa farmers are paid less than it costs to produce the cocoa beans. They cannot afford to send their children to school or put good food on their tables (if they have any table!). All, so that our tummies can be full of delicious chocolate. In New Zealand it is difficult to imagine what their lives must be like.

Easter eggs are more expensive than a chocolate bar yet chocolate bars have MORE chocolate than Easter eggs. The chocolate companies are happier than ever to take your money and buy cocoa beans cheaply at this time of the year. The more they buy the cheaper the price, but at what cost to peoples lives?

A better alternative is to buy Fair-trade chocolate – you could even buy chocolate moulds and melt it down to make your own eggs. I am asking my parents to buy me trade aid chocolate this year instead of an easter egg.

I just found out when I looked at their website that children in West Africa MY AGE (9) have to work hard on cocoa bean plantations - is child slavery one of the ingredients in your easter egg this year?

Hope

4 comments:

jeanie said...

Hey Hope...You've got some awesome stuff running throuhg that brain of yours!!! I'm very impressed.

Btw, if you are interested in knowing how chocolate is made up, the differences bewteen they types, their uses etc feel free to shoot me questions. (I'm a chef, well still studying but will finish up in June.) And I LOVE chocolate too.

Keep up the good writing.

lulu said...

mate.. 9 years old and an your absoulte legend!

Good stuff Hope

Rhett said...

Hey Hope I am putting a link to your blog on mine! Your blog is awesome :).

Iain said...

And the best bit about buying Chocolate - and not Chocolate EGGS - is that it is almost certainly still economical at Fair Trade prices.

I melted down my own chocolate into a mould for my girlfriend this easter. Rather than giving her a 150g piddly easter egg for about $7 or $8 from Countdown, I gave her a pure, dark chocolate, solid/filled, 1Kg easter egg for about $6!

While I'm talking economics, the Fair Trade coffee is cheaper than some other brands in the supermarket, keep an eye out for it, people!