Caobisco president Aldo Cristiano opens World Confectionery Conference
Aldo Cristiano, president of Caobisco has opened our World Confectionery Conference with a keynote presentation underlining the importance of supporting the sector and progressing major due diligence sustainability policies, reports Neill Barston.
Speaking via an exclusively recorded address, he offered hope for the industry facing a significant raft of challenges including higher energy and ingredients prices, as well as ongoing logistics issues that have been worsened by the war in Ukraine.
The president of the group, which represents more than 12,000 chocolate, biscuit and confectionery businesses across Europe, who also serves as head of institutional affairs and sustainability at Ferrero in Germany, believed gains had been made by major players in the sector against core issues including supporting cocoa communities.
He said: “Twelve months ago during the digital World Confectionery Conference, I mentioned that embracing sustainability had become a priority for our industry. As food producers, we heavily depend on the agricultural sector in Europe, in Africa, South America and Asia – and so many members have continued to engage in concrete actions on the ground for more sustainable supply chains such as cocoa, through private initiatives to empower cocoa farmers, while contributing to reaching decent living incomes, climate resilience and environmental and human rights protections,” explained the president who said that positive changes were being seen.
He cited the establishment of the Cocoa and Forests Initiative over the past five years, which has centred on preventing deforestation as a key driver of industry engagement on supporting core communities, including major supplier nations in Ghana and Ivory Coast.
As Confectionery Production has previously reported, the two West African nations are responsible for sourcing around two thirds of cocoa supplies for the chocolate sector – though its farming communities still face considerable risks from poverty, and issues relating to child labour and deforestation.
Cristiano continued: “Caobisco members have been taking very concrete steps through their own voluntary programmes, to mitigate and minimise risk of deforestation in supply chains. Some also started robust due diligence systems to mitigate and prevent from possible risks on human rights and the environment.
“We as Caobisco have also been fully engaged in dialogues in the upcoming EU legislations on deforestation free products, and on corporate sustainability due diligence – It’s a shared responsibility for all supply chain actors who must act collectively to achieve a sustainable food sector, from farm-to-fork,” adding that the organisation had made contributions to the European Union’s own code of conduct on responsible business and marketing practices.
He added that behaving in a sustainable manner in industry is something that the organisation has been focused upon for decades. On this he cited applied research with the likes of the European Cocoa Association, as well as contributing impact on crop and disease management in support of the sector.
In a further example, he noted that Caobisco had also engaged with the International labour organisation (ILO) in Turkey for work relating to the seasonal production of hazelnuts, aiming to combat child labour identified in supply chains within the segment. The project has now run for 10 years, with the president citing the fact that it has seen 10,000 children prevented from child labour.
“In August this year, together with a delegation from Caobisco, I went to Turkey where the project is taking place. I can tell the progress that has taken place towards enrolling children into school, and the progress that is being made there, as well as the commitment for authorities there in tackling child labour was great to see in person,” which he cited as a great example of multi-stakeholder engagement.
While he acknowledged the success of the scheme, he believed ‘there’s still a lot to do,” but noted that private and public bodies together was the way forward to tackling such issues, and added that the organisation would continue its work in supporting concrete actions through legislative frameworks presently being put forward within the EU. – See the full report and review of the event in an upcoming edition of Confectionery Production magazine.