Premium chocolate maker Lindt & Sprüngli has found itself facing a legal challenge in the US, as it stands accused of misleading consumers over the scale of its actions aimed at eradicating child labour in supply chains, reports Neill Barston.

The case, that began in Columbia, Washington last week, which the Swiss business has refuted, was brought by legal firm International Rights Advocates, which has a longstanding association with representing clients in the cocoa and other agricultural sectors.

As reported locally, one of central arguments of the legal action is on the basis that the business has stated its intention to end child labour in its own supply chains in West Africa, yet to continues to profit from this, and in the law firm’s assertion, has taken little direct action in preventing the practice – which remains widespread in Ghana and Ivory Coast.

According to relatively recent research by NORC at the University of Chicago, there remain some 1.56 million children at risk of being used in potentially hazardous labour surrounding the cocoa trade – no major evidence has been presented that the figure has gone down further in the past few years, as cocoa communities face renewed crisis conditions in which underlying poverty has meant that farmers are in many instances unable to afford the cost of hiring adult labourers, and are intensely reliant on their own families. 

With many agricultural workers reportedly earning less than $1 a day, well below UN levels of defined poverty, the industry remains deeply impacted by a combination of a lack of long-term structural investment, adverse weather conditions including an anticipated damaging El Nino event this autumn, and extensive crop disease which have all impacted yields.

Notably, in 2024, as previously reported, Lindt had faced similar assertions in a Swiss TV documentary aired on the SRF channel, which focused on a plantation in Tepa, Western Ghana. It was alleged child labour was a clear issue, and the company stated that of the 80,000 farmers it worked with, ensuring ethically supplied sourcing was a core priority. Its own sustainability report finding in that year, that of 8,491 surprise visits to farms, 87 child workers were found, and had taken steps to address the matter.

In response to the latest claims this month, Lindt moved to deny the allegations, stating that it was well aware of the issue at hand, asserting that it had policies in place to tackle child labour.

Notably, the business established a system last year in which it targeted supplying from only those that had child labour monitoring systems in place – this was perceived as a direct response to the incoming EUDR regulations, and parallel corporate due diligence laws on human rights that will be operative within Europe shortly. 

in a statement to the AWP news agency the company noted that it took such cases seriously, which was reflected in its company policies.

The business said: “We have supplier guidelines in place, and systematically investigate all suspected cases of child labour within our supply chains.”