Cocoa-growing communities in Côte d’Ivoire, West Africa, forced to drink water from unsafe ditches and streams.
Source: Water Witness
The Côte d’Ivoire supplies the major chocolate importing nations in Europe and the US, and major brands including Mars, Nestle, Ferrero, Cadbury-Mondelez, Lindt, Ben and Jerry’s (Unilever), Tony’s Chocolonely, Godiva, Hershey’s and Starbucks.
Report by Catherine Early
As much as 40 per cent of the world’s cocoa crop is grown in the West African country.
The global cocoa trade had an estimated worth of $130 billion in 2025, with the three main trading companies – Cargill, Barry Callebaut and Olam Group – making profits between $400 million and $3.8 billion the financial year from April 2023 alone.
Bathtubs
Yet Côte d’Ivoire is one of the world’s poorest economies. The United Nations Human Development Index places it 157 out of 191 countries.
A third of the country’s population of 33 million people relies on the cocoa trade directly, which generates 15 per cent of its gross domestic product.
Nearly three quarters 73 per cent of the rural population lacks access to safely managed water, and 86 per cent has no sanitation.
The water footprint of cocoa has received relatively little attention, despite the fact that around 2,400 litres, or 16 bathtubs of water, are needed to produce 100g of chocolate.
Dirty
Cocoa crops need a significant amount of water, meaning that chocolate has one of the largest water footprints of any food product by volume of finished product.
Between 2023 and 2024, a team of Ivorian and international academics and NGOs interviewed farmers, communities and representatives of government and the private sector in Côte d’Ivoire about the impacts of the chocolate’s water footprint.
They found that not a single cocoa-growing community has reliable access to safe water, sanitation, or
hygiene facilities, neither on farms, public places, workplaces nor in growers’ homes.
Farming communities they visited have no option but to take drinking water from unsafe ditches, streams and shallow wells. They also lack decent toilets, safe sanitation and handwashing facilities, and there is widespread open defecation.
“We have no water here,” Mrs Koua, a cocoa grower from the Moronou Region of Côte d’Ivoire, told the researchers: “The children go on bikes to the well. It might be dirty, but we have no choice – we can’t afford to care about quality.”
Refurbished
Malaria and diarrhoea are common due to the lack of good sanitation, she added.
The research identified that water and sanitation issues are a blind spot for government, cocoa traders and buyers and chocolate companies.
Many of the cocoa growers are members of cooperatives certified by voluntary standard systems including Fair Trade and Rainforest Alliance.
In one case, a primary school serving more than 150 children had no toilets, running water, or soap. Pupils defecated in the surrounding bushes, which they also used as their playground.
This is despite the fact the school was recently refurbished by the local producer organisation with support from Barry Callebaut, Ben and Jerry’s and Fairtrade Premium funds. Barry Callebaut did not respond to a request for comment.
Justice
Fairtrade certification requires that all workers have access to clean drinking water, as well as access to toilets and hand washing facilities.
A spokesperson said: “Fairtrade recognises that there is a lot of work to do in order to help remediate water poverty and we are committed to our role and are open to work with organisations and partners to help make a difference.”
The Ecologist delivers high-impact environmental journalism, exposing the threats to our planet and highlighting solutions for a fairer, more sustainable world.
Your donation will pay a freelance journalist to deliver exclusive research on the issues that matter to us most.
The Ecologist | The Resurgence Centre | Hartland, EX39 6AB GB
And low taxes ensure high income for some and poverty for the rest.
Côte d’Ivoire farm firms pay only 2% of potential profit taxes, World Bank
Thursday, 11 September 2025 10:33
World Bank report highlights weak tax contribution from agriculture despite large exports
Farm companies achieve only 2% of potential corporate tax revenue, versus 63% in industry
Export duties on cocoa and cashew remain key revenue source, not profit taxation
Agriculture in Côte d’Ivoire is among the sectors that remain lightly taxed, alongside mining, trade, construction, and telecommunications, according to the World Bank’s latest economic report on the country. The study points to a sharp imbalance in tax collection.
Based on analysis from the CIRES economic policy unit (CAPEC), the report shows that farm companies contribute only 2% of their potential in corporate profit taxes, leaving a 98% gap between actual and potential tax revenue. By comparison, industry reaches 63% of its potential and services 80%. The shortfall is even larger in export agriculture, with just 1% effort for fishing and forestry products.
The World Bank notes that this gap stems from multiple factors, including preferential regimes and exemptions often granted for political or social reasons, administrative complexity, and the size of the informal economy. Reforms in tax administration and emerging economic changes have cut the informal sector’s share of GDP by nearly 10 points since the 2000s, to 38% in 2020. But the sector still employs over 80% of the workforce and remains a major barrier to broader tax collection.
Retired, living in the Scottish Borders after living most of my life in cities in England. I can now indulge my interest in all aspects of living close to nature in a wild landscape. I live on what was once the Iapetus Ocean which took millions of years to travel from the Southern Hemisphere to here in the Northern Hemisphere. That set me thinking and questioning and seeking answers.
In 1998 I co-wrote Millennium Countdown (US)/ A Business Guide to the Year 2000 (UK) see https://www.abebooks.co.uk/products/isbn/9780749427917
borderslynn 