PROGRESS BLOG
PIONEERING A NEW APPROACH TO COCOA SUSTAINABILITY
Cocoa Life is celebrating 10 years of lifting up cocoa communities and shaping the landscapes where cocoa grows. 10 years of working on-the-ground with partners, and the women & men who grow cocoa to help everyone benefit from the bean that becomes the chocolate we love. 10 years of innovating and taking what works to scale so we can move cocoa forward together.
10 Years of Cocoa Life
In 2022, to celebrate ten years of helping lift the people and protect the landscapes where cocoa grows, the Cocoa Life team launched the ‘10 Stories For 10 Years’ campaign. We spoke to key partners from across the program – from farmers to community members, local co-operative leads to global NGOs, our suppliers to our advisors – to tell 10 stories from the past decade. These stories highlight how Cocoa Life is helping make cocoa sourcing more sustainable in key cocoa-producing countries, and demonstrate how through smart innovation and collaboration, we are helping to make cocoa right.
When we started Cocoa Life, we pioneered a new approach to more sustainable cocoa sourcing: investing and working directly on-the-ground with cocoa-growing communities to deliver measurable impact, at scale, where change is needed; getting clearer visibility across the cocoa supply chain; and working to tackle all the different interconnected challenges. By co-creating integrated solutions tailored to the farmer, community, and environmental needs, we have seen positive impact on farmer incomes, the cocoa communities, and landscapes. To learn more about how we have been moving cocoa forward together over the past ten years, you can find the full series here.
"We believe that a more sustainable cocoa supply chain begins with empowered cocoa farmers. That is why Cocoa Life works side-by-side in cocoa producing countries with partners, the national institutions and most importantly the men & women whose livelihood it is to grow our cocoa. Through this approach we have seen communities become stronger and able to drive their own development. Of the over 2,500 communities we work with, all of them have Community Action Plans in place and 70% of these plans are supported by the local governments."
Cathy Pieters, Vice President Sustainable Ingredients & Cocoa Life, Mondelēz International