Nestlé makes progress on empowering women in cocoa supply chain

The work kicked off in 2013; now Nestlé said: "We’re making more headway with our partners on this important issue". In recent months, for example, the Swiss helped train four cocoa cooperatives on gender issues in order to open more roles, such as lead farmers and nursery managers, to women. The cooperatives have also now produced their own action plans for improving the positions of women in the cocoa supply chain.

 

The new measures are reflected in a new progress report Nestlé has published on its Action Plan, part of the Nestlé Cocoa Plan programme launched in 2013 in Côte d’Ivoire to improve the lives of cocoa farmers and the quality of their crops, and to tackle low productivity and child labour. As part of the other steps taken recently, the number of women who lead and oversee Nestlé cocoa plantlet nurseries has increased from 3% to 23%. There are a total of 32 Nestlé-run plantlet nurseries. Nestlé plans to expand the roll out of its Action Plan for female cocoa farmers to Ghana in mid-2016.