Food In Canada

47% of Barry Callebaut cocoa was sourced sustainably

Food in Canada   

Sustainability Confectionery Barry Callebaut cocoa Sustainable


Barry Callebaut announced that in fiscal year 2018/19 it sourced 47 per cent of the cocoa and 54 per cent of the other ingredients it uses sustainably. This sourcing achievement is highlighted in Barry Callebaut’s Forever Chocolate Progress Report 2018/19, its third progress report since the launch of its Forever Chocolate plan in 2016, tracking the group’s progress towards making sustainable chocolate the norm.

Forever Chocolate is based on four ambitious targets, to be achieved by 2025, that address the largest sustainability challenges in the chocolate supply chain:

  • More than 500,000 cocoa farmers will have been lifted out of poverty
  • Eradicate child labour from the supply chain
  • Become carbon and forest positive
  • Have 100 per cent sustainable ingredients in all products

Of all the agricultural raw materials Barry Callebaut sourced, 51 per cent were sustainably sourced in 2018/19. The Group sourced 47 per cent of its cocoa beans through sustainability programs. This percentage includes the group’s Cocoa Horizons program as well as its customers’ own programs and external certification organizations such as UTZ Certified, Rainforest Alliance, Fairtrade and Organic. Furthermore, Barry Callebaut sourced 54 per cent of its non-cocoa agricultural raw materials sustainably. This includes the use of sustainability certification schemes for the respective ingredients.

Sustainable chocolate

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In order to have more than 500,000 cocoa farmers lifted out of poverty by 2025, the group is mapping the cocoa farms in its supply chain. As of the end 2018/19 the group had full data on 176,984 farms and their farmers entered into its Katchilè database. This database provides key insights into the location, farm size, socio-economic and household data of cocoa farms and their farmers. This data allows Barry Callebaut to offer tailor-made advice at individual farm level on how to improve productivity via Farm Business Plans and Farm Services.

Prospering Farmers

Over 16,000 farmers have adopted Farm Business Plans and 49,909 (+303 per cent) farmers in Côte d’Ivoire, Ghana, Cameroon, Brazil and Indonesia have access to farm services, including coaching as well as other inputs such as tools, seedlings and finance. The premiums from the purchase of HORIZONS products generated CHF 15 million in funds (+40 per cent). These premiums allowed more than 135,000 farmers to take part in programs focusing on improving their productivity and income. These premiums also financed child labour sensitization programs, training 27,448 farmers. Barry Callebaut estimates that 184,623 cocoa farmers in its supply chain have been lifted out of poverty.

Become carbon and forest positive by 2025

In pursuit of its target to store more carbon emissions than it produces by 2025, Barry Callebaut reduced in 2018/19 its corporate CO2 equivalent (CO2e) footprint from 9.10 million tonnes to 8.49 million tonnes in fiscal year 2018/19 (-6.7 per cent), whilst achieving +5.1 per cent volume growth.

The main drivers of this achievement were reduced CO2e emissions from land-use change, reduced CO2e intensity in factories and reduced CO2e intensity in dairy products. The CO2e intensity per tonne of product also decreased from 4.45 to 3.92, and additional contributions from scope three insetting projects lowered this even further to 3.88 (-13 per cent). Of the Group’s factories, 17 out of 62 are now running on 100 per cent renewable energy.


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