Hershey’s misses

4 Dec 2020 By Dasha Afanasieva Follow @dasha_reuters

Ghana and Ivory Coast may stop selling sustainable beans to the Reese’s maker, accusing it of dodging payments for impoverished farmers. That could make it harder for the $31 bln group to flaunt its sustainability kudos. The snag is that so far shareholders don’t seem to care.

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Ivory Coast and Ghana on Nov. 30 said they would cancel all cocoa sustainability schemes that U.S.-based Hershey runs in their countries, accusing the confectioner of trying to avoid paying a cocoa surcharge by sourcing the commodity through futures contracts, rather than buying it directly.

The countries, which produce two-thirds of the world’s cocoa, said they are also barring third-party companies from running sustainability schemes in the west African nations on behalf of Hershey.

From this year, the two countries are adding a surcharge, called the living income differential, of $400 a tonne to the price of cocoa to tackle poverty among farmers.

Hershey declined to comment on the countries’ claims directly. It said in a statement that it was already “fully participating” in the living income differential for the current 2020/2021 crop, and that it will continue to do so to support cocoa farmer livelihoods.

Context News

The countries, which produce two-thirds of the world’s cocoa, said they are also barring third-party companies from running sustainability schemes in the west African nations on behalf of Hershey.

From this year, the two countries are adding a surcharge, called the living income differential, of $400 a tonne to the price of cocoa to tackle poverty among farmers.

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