How to buy more sustainable chocolate

There are some serious ethical and sustainability issues associated with cocoa production. Here's how you can find out more about the chocolate you buy and what sustainability certifications you should look for.

Cocoa needs to be grown within 10 degrees north or south of the equator, and more than 70% of the world’s cocoa is grown in West Africa. It isn’t native to Africa, though – the cocoa plant originated in South America.

While most of the cocoa in the world is grown in these equatorial regions, the majority of chocolate consumed worldwide is made and eaten in Europe and the USA.

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The ethics of the cocoa supply chain

Cocoa trees are usually grown by smallholder farmers, rather than large agricultural businesses. According to a recent Oxfam report, cocoa provides income for more than five million families globally. 

These small-scale farmers often have very little voice within the supply chain, which can quickly lead to ethical problems.

Once it's harvested, the majority of the world's cocoa is bought by a handful of large trading companies. There are six trader/grinders responsible for at least 60% of the global cocoa trade. 

These traders then sell the cocoa on to well-known chocolate companies – such as Ferrero, Mars, Mondelez (Cadbury’s) and Nestlé – for processing. 

The governments of Cote d’Ivoire and Ghana set an annual ‘farmgate’ price for cocoa, which must be paid to farmers and provides some stability as the price of cocoa can be very volatile, depending on supply and demand.

Cocoa prices have risen significantly over the last couple of years because of poor harvests – in part, blamed on climate change. But there’s no guarantee that farmers will keep receiving this price in the future. 

According to a 2021 study, up to 58% of cocoa farmers in Cote d’Ivoire and Ghana live below the World Bank extreme-poverty line, and 90% do not earn a living income.

Child labour is a recognised issue on cocoa farms – children are taken out of school to work in dangerous conditions on their family farms. Much of this issue is down to the poverty that farmers face, making it impossible to earn a living without using their children as part of the workforce.

Sustainability in the cocoa industry

The ethical issues of cocoa go hand in hand with devastating ecological damage. Farmers living below the poverty line simply cannot afford to use more sustainable methods, which can add to their costs.

According to the National Wildlife Federation, 94% of forest in the Cote d’Ivoire and 80% in Ghana has been lost in the last 60 years. Around a third of that deforestation has been attributed to cocoa production.

Cocoa trees deplete the soil they are grown on of nutrients, which means future yields of cocoa go down over time. One way to mitigate this is to use agroforestry to fertilise the soil – a practice that involves growing cocoa trees alongside other trees and shrubs that boost the soil at the same time. 

But farmers struggling to make ends meet favour clearing more forest instead, as this is far cheaper in the short-term than agroforestry.

Poore and Nemecek’s meta-analysis of food systems (2018), which measured the environmental impact of food items, found that – per kilogram – dark chocolate was the second largest greenhouse gas (GHG) emitting food of all those it looked at. The study calculated an average 47kg CO2e of GHG emissions per kilogram of chocolate produced. It was only beaten by beef, which had more than double the impact (99kg CO2e).

Over half of dark chocolate's GHG emissions in the study were calculated based on land-use change – in other words, the knock-on impact of the deforestation driven by its agriculture. 

However, all the foods that Poore and Nemecek assessed have a large spectrum of impacts – the various methods and supply chains can make a big difference to the emissions impact of one particular product.

In dark chocolate’s case, the spectrum is even more wide-ranging than most. The average figure doesn't reveal that, in actual fact, the 10% of producers with the least GHG emissions actually had a positive impact – which means they are removing, rather than adding, emissions to the enviroment. This is likely down to the way their cocoa crop was grown, as well as other factors.

Compare this to the lowest 10% of beef producers, where even those with best practice still produced 37kg of GHG emissions. 

Conversely, the top 10% of cocoa growers had a huge impact that was very close to the top 10% of beef herd producers (258kg CO2e of GHG emissions per kg of chocolate vs 269kg CO2e per kg of beef).

How to buy more ethical and sustainably grown chocolate

Ethical Consumer suggests that the best bet is to buy chocolate that is actually processed and made in the country the cocoa is grown in. This is likely to mean far more money goes into the local economy. The downside is that this generally only applies to smaller-scale brands, many of which can only be bought online. 

Examples that Ethical Consumer gives in its review of ethical chocolate include Fairafric and Paccari.

The annual Chocolate Scorecard produced by Be Slavery Free is a useful resource for more information on big and small brands. 

Its assessment takes into consideration aspects including commitments to providing a living income, how well policies protect against deforestation and investment in agroforestry. It is based in Australia, but covers some big international brands and UK-based retailers. 

Tony’s Chocolonely takes the top spot in the rating for medium and large companies, followed by Ritter Sport.

For small companies Original Beans tops the table of brands assessed by the scorecard.

Another option is to look for independent certification – the most recognised schemes are Fairtrade International (FI) and Rainforest Alliance.

For more about these labels and others, read our guide on decoding food labels: sustainability, welfare and food safety

Fairtrade International

Fairtrade covers environmental, economic and social standards. It’s the only scheme that currently sets minimum market prices for what farmers and producers are selling, to cover the cost of sustainable production. Sometimes the price of cocoa set by a country’s government may be above this, but Fairtrade International offers protection when it falls.

It also gives an additional premium to invest in community projects.

To be certified, farms also need to have fair working conditions, ban forced and child labour, and meet environmental criteria – such as responsible waste management and water use, and minimal use of pesticides.

The Fairtrade Mark is used on products that are certified – where all the ingredients that can be sourced as Fairtrade are, indeed, Fairtrade.

The Fairtrade Sourced Ingredients (FSI) Mark can be used on products where only one commodity in a product is Fairtrade, such as the cocoa in chocolate. The FSI mark will tell you what the commodity is, and the presence of an arrow alongside it indicates that there is more information to be found about that commodity on the pack.

Rainforest Alliance

Rainforest Alliance certified cocoa guarantees that farmers will have been granted a ‘sustainability differential’ on top of the market price. This is currently $70 per megatonne of cocoa. In return, the farmer's practices comply with the Rainforest Alliance Standard. 

It also offers Sustainability Investments (SI) on top, which equate to an additional payment. But unlike Fairtrade, there is no minimum price.

Fair for Life

Fair for Life is another reputable Fairtrade certification, but it certifies the whole company group rather than single brands.

It doesn't have a set minimum price as it allows for negotiation between the buyer and seller, but the price must always be at or above a floor price. It also pays an additional premium for development. 

In-house sustainability certifications

Big companies like Barry Callebaut (a manufacturer and processor of cocoa for other brands), Mondelez and Nestlé have their own in-house sustainability certifications.

Barry Callebaut’s is called Cocoa Horizons, Mondelez has Cocoa Life and Nestlé has Cocoa Plan. While all of these have elements that are similar to independent schemes like Fairtrade and Rainforest Alliance, they are not independently audited and none of them offer a minimum cocoa price to farmers

Ethical Consumer says these schemes tend to ‘lack transparency’, so they aren't recognised in its brand ratings.

Organic

While organic cocoa has some good sustainability benefits, it doesn’t guarantee the same ethical requirements as Fairtrade or Rainforest Alliance. 

Ideally, look for chocolate that is certified with both one of these and organic. Soil Association is the most commonly found organic certification that you'll see on chocolate in the UK, but there are others, such as Organic Farmers and Growers (OF&G).

Chocolate ingredients and sustainability

Because cocoa can cause such detriment to the environment, the way the cocoa is produced is the most important determining factor of chocolate sustainability.

However, other ingredients can also take an environmental toll. 

While cocoa makes up a lot of what's in chocolate, there are other ingredients that have their own sustainability considerations. For milk chocolate, cocoa is sometimes the third ingredient after milk powder and sugar.

Milk powder

Dairy farming can have a significant environmental impact. The damaging effects of cows' methane emissions on the planet are well known. However, milk still comes far lower down the table than dark chocolate in Poore and Nemecek’s assessment of GHG emissions. 

Looking beyond emissions, milk production can also be very water intensive – a lot of water is used to grow the crops that cows eat. The process of making milk into a powder is energy intensive, too – so unless renewable energy is being used, this adds to the carbon cost.

Vegan chocolate options replace the creaminess of dairy milk with alternatives such as hazelnut, almond, oat and rice. These can all have their own environmental impacts but, on the whole, are less damaging than dairy. 

Read more in our guide to plant milks: what's best for your health and the environment?

Palm oil

A common ingredient in lots of chocolate, unsustainable palm can have devastating effects on rainforests. 

You can find out more in our guide to how to buy sustainable palm oil.

In a nutshell, look out for brands that use Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil (RSPO) certified oil. You might see the RSPO logo on packaging, or you can look up the brand you are considering on the WWF’s Palm Oil Buyers’ Scorecard. 

You can also try the World Association of Zoos and Aquariums' PalmOil Scan app, which is available on the Apple App Store and Google Play store.

Soya

Soy lecithin is another common ingredient in chocolate. It thins melted chocolate to make it easier to mould. But soy is another ingredient associated with rainforest destruction. 

Responsible chocolate producers use certified soya, such as the Roundtable on Responsible Soy or Proterra, and have signed up to commitments to be deforestation-free by 2025. Some soya is also grown in Europe.

Sugar

Chocolate can be made with either cane sugar or beet sugar. UK or European-made chocolate will often use beet sugar.

Sugar cane is grown in tropical and subtropical regions; beet sugar is grown in temperate regions, including in large quantities in the UK. As a result, the sustainability and ethical issues for both are very different.

Sugar cane is water intensive, can use a lot of pesticides and is responsible for deforestation. Look for Bonsucro certification for more sustainable sugar cane.

Sugar beet can be damaging to soil health and erosion. As well as this, it’s hit headlines in the past for its pesticide use.

In 2024, the UK government granted emergency authorisation for Thiamethoxam, a neonicotinoid that is known to be lethal to bees, to be used for the fourth year in a row – even though it's officially been banned in the UK since 2018.

The justification for the relaxation of the ban is to protect from a particular virus, which in 2020 killed a quarter of the sugar beet crop (worth £67m). However, it is only permitted for use if there is evidence that the likelihood of the virus striking is 65% or more.