If you love chocolate, the Ivory Coast can not be indifferent. After all produced the country that is on the brink of civil war and where an international military intervention is likely almost 40 percent of the raw cocoa in the world .
In the presidential elections in late October, it was not least about who cocoa production and trade brings forward again: President Laurent Gbagbo (controls the south of the country), or challengers Alassane Ouattara (a pact with the rebels in the north). A large part of the electorate lives directly or indirectly from cocoa, and the rival parties to fill with the funds from the cocoa world market in its coffers ( backgrounds in the NZZ ).
So always in the Ivory Coast cocoa policy a central question of power. "The resentment of the cocoa farmers Gbagbo has tasted the victory," analyzed the taz . Gbagbo rebuilt the cocoa trade structures, the corruption in the sector tried to fight, but the result turned a few satisfied - in the end everything was confusing, corrupt and the poor poorer anyway. The association of cocoa and coffee producers in the Ivory Coast (Anaprocci), the main farmers' union in the country was, from even a recommendation to vote for Ouattara.
The Ivory Coast has long been an economic miracle with relative stability and close relations with Europe and America, a model country for the West and investment haven for international companies. The chaos of the last decade, the Ivorians won the stronger Gbagbo named.
The corporations of the "Big Chocolate" are nervous
More than 90 percent of Ivorian cocoa is exported to Europe and North America, the EU shall receive 60 percent of exports from the Ivory Coast, particularly the Netherlands, Belgium and the ex-colonial power France but also Switzerland and Germany.
companies like Nestle, Mars, force (Milka, Suchard, Cadbury), Hershey, Barry Callebaut, Cargill, Blommer, ADM, Ferrero look nervously to the turmoil in the West African country. The chocolate-industrial complex ( "Big Chocolate" ) has enormous interests (such as coffee, sugar, cotton and oil industries as well). Because of the growing world market - currently estimated at some EUR 40 billion - needs the beans of the Ivorian plantations.
policy always plays a role. The "brown gold", that raw material for our chocolates, is controlled by corrupt cliques in the guise of government regulation and quasi-official intermediary, and slave labor on plantations is tolerated in this system. Companies are under pressure for years to improve the working and income conditions for cocoa farmers, child trafficking and slavery-like child labor on plantations not to suffer further. Under the label of International Cocoa Initiative (ICI) engage the companies with all kinds of projects, but doubt many NGOs, the effectiveness, as long as the system installed by the political system of profit levy continues (backgrounds in time , the information center and a chocolate study of 2010 the University of Duisburg-Essen for the Federal Ministry of Development, "Human Rights in the cultivation of cocoa. An inventory of the initiatives of the cocoa and chocolate industry," ).
quality and sustainability, controls are in Ivory Coast is extremely difficult. The German company ritter sport who cares about environmental and social well bought, so dear in Latin America - but not only. In Greenpeace Magazine noted the CEO.
policy always plays a role. The "brown gold", that raw material for our chocolates, is controlled by corrupt cliques in the guise of government regulation and quasi-official intermediary, and slave labor on plantations is tolerated in this system. Companies are under pressure for years to improve the working and income conditions for cocoa farmers, child trafficking and slavery-like child labor on plantations not to suffer further. Under the label of International Cocoa Initiative (ICI) engage the companies with all kinds of projects, but doubt many NGOs, the effectiveness, as long as the system installed by the political system of profit levy continues (backgrounds in time , the information center and a chocolate study of 2010 the University of Duisburg-Essen for the Federal Ministry of Development, "Human Rights in the cultivation of cocoa. An inventory of the initiatives of the cocoa and chocolate industry," ).
quality and sustainability, controls are in Ivory Coast is extremely difficult. The German company ritter sport who cares about environmental and social well bought, so dear in Latin America - but not only. In Greenpeace Magazine noted the CEO.
" come as a volume manufacturer, we can not but also from the world's largest cocoa producing region resources belong not to Our supplier can offer assurance that in the so-called West Africa lots and cocoa from the Ivory Coast is what would be our desire to (...) But we are -. to be able too small to affect significantly on the spot in West Africa - particularly in international comparison. Therefore, we try for membership in institutions and association work . In fairness, attach one must, however, that their influence is very limited, especially in a country like the Ivory Coast, where there was, until recently, civil war and direct contacts with producers almost impossible are . "
The crisis is driving prices - but the markets are not in excitement
While on the commodity exchanges have been no major turbulence However, the crisis drove around the Schokoladentag Nicholas cocoa price already. in height, as the FTD reported. In November and December were the ports closed at times, hundreds of thousands of tons of cocoa beans were stuck in ports and on the plantations. According to estimates in the last quarter to 100,000 tonnes of smuggled to neighboring Ghana, to bring them to world markets. funding via this route that anyway for years, the FN rebels in the north, behind the opposition leader Alassane Ouattara and elected President.
While on the commodity exchanges have been no major turbulence However, the crisis drove around the Schokoladentag Nicholas cocoa price already. in height, as the FTD reported. In November and December were the ports closed at times, hundreds of thousands of tons of cocoa beans were stuck in ports and on the plantations. According to estimates in the last quarter to 100,000 tonnes of smuggled to neighboring Ghana, to bring them to world markets. funding via this route that anyway for years, the FN rebels in the north, behind the opposition leader Alassane Ouattara and elected President.
NZZ As reported there, but still sense of normalcy despite the political crisis . The port of the capital Abidjan is open again, operating in the port of San Pedro, where two thirds of the Ivorian cocoa is shipped is problematic. And the harvest was good, "Currently, weight the international markets, these positive developments, at least as high as the risks of political crisis," the NZZ.
This has however not to last. gamblers and speculators betting on continued rise in the guaranteed prices, if the worsening crisis. Currently hope and economic policy nor the fact that the crisis can be defused in the country with the two presidents by an international mediation effort. African Heads of States have so far been as unsuccessful as the threats of the EU to cut the funding for the Ivory Coast, where President Laurent Gbagbo will not do. So far the country has 1.7 billion euros in EU aid received. In the period from 2008 to 2013 are provided € 254.7 million, reports the Tagesspiegel . The World Bank and the U.S. wants to turn off the money tap.
Gbagbo's old friends in Europe
That the international community so strongly interested in the small country, is not given the current resource conflicts in the world surprising.
The crisis now is a lot of background reports in the media published that analyze the international network of interests. For example, is devoted to the French newspaper Libération the "French networks of Gbagbo."
The Ivorians played hard but in domestic politics, the nationalist card, accusing the former IMF director and the U.S. received a doctorate Ouattara to be a puppet of foreign countries - either the Americans or the French. Towards Paris Gbagbo railed like with "neo-colonialism". But he himself is linked to French interests for a long time, ever since his exile in France in the 1980s. Libération is one of the seven "families" to assist it: an old guard of French Mitterrand's socialists, the advocates of sovereignty (the reactionary National Front included), the muscle packages (security professionals), advertisers, businessmen, lobbyists and lawyers
- background is the concept of. Françafrique, a kind of special relationship between Ivory Coast (and other African countries) and the ex-colonial power. What is meant is "that part of government, some private network, the mafia-like way to control a significant part of African politics and economies," as Telepolis once wrote.
Years ago, Nicolas Sarkozy had a radical departure from these intimate connections announced that it was not much. In dubious machinations and the preservation of authoritarian regime, France is still entangled, and French groups use the network and its benefits to gain access to raw materials and markets, under the protection of the French government, as the station RFI ("50 years later, Françafrique is alive and well ") also recently noted as the radio Germany (Françafrique - a school of the dictators of France's Africa policy under fire")..
Françafrique is also a political Permanent bone of contention between Ivorians and a personal problem for Gbagbo, for his power thanks also to the system of mutual Françafrique before graduation. "The story of the relationship between Gbagbo and the former colonial power is that of a disappointed love ," says the newspaper Libération. To France, he was once hot, now cold feelings. His friends in Paris, he uses time and again, no matter what motivates them. And as this excellent contacts in the French political and business world have influenced the line in Paris very well.
hired a lobbyist in Washington - but the throws
On the other side of the Atlantic took Gbagbo prominent lobbyists and PR people under contract to take on the U.S. government and the Western States influence: former U.S. Secretary of Agriculture Michael Espy and Lanny Davis , former legal adviser by Bill Clinton. This attracted considerable controversy. Davis offered himself for $ 100,000 monthly salary as an alternative communication channel and intermediaries and publicly defended the decision to represent Gbagbo (for example, in interviews with Salon and the NY Times ).
On 29 Davis announced in December, however, with the Ivorian embassy in Washington that he resign from the mandate ( NY Times ). Supposedly because Gbagbo had refused to make a phone call with President Obama. withdraw reportedly Gbagbo has also Davis' Council dismissed brusquely. Perhaps Davis was also too hot to be seen as a friend to a dictator. Some human rights organizations such as HumanRights.org had launched a campaign to Davis pushing for the return of the mandate. The fluidized media was enormous.
Meanwhile Gbagbo calls back $ 200,000 of the fee already paid $ 300,000; Davis has already spent the money but for his team, the "round the clock worked. The amount of the fee is not unusual for foreign governments and the significant staff effort ( Politico ).
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