Minicase Page 177-178 Is your Chocolate the Result of Unfair Exploitation of Child labor?

1. Should labor practices in another country be a relevant consideration in international

trade? Why or why not?

Labor practices in another country should be relevant consideration in international trade,

because they are an essential part of it. In order to produce a product, item or do some type of
service; labor is needed. Labor practices should be not ignored by the international trade
community, otherwise many conflicts might surge, and worsen international trade interactions,
even to the point to cause economic instability in those countries involved with such unfair labor
practices.

In this case of the chocolate- production by child slaves, we can see how irony takes
place from companies involved and the top 10 chocolate-consuming nations, who have aware of
such unfair practices since long time ago. They should take drastically measures in order to stop
the use of child slaves for the production of chocolate. Many of these companies have long lists
of ethics within is internal policies, politicians talked about moral and ethics to the public, but in
this case they have acted very tepid, because it has been a long time with a no clear solution yet.

The developing countries where this is happening have weak-corrupted governments, that
don’t take care of their children, but the developed nations and companies involved in the
chocolate trade should applied the CRA before performing any type of trade.

2. With regard to trade in products such as cocoa, what options are available to
governments, businesses, and consumers, for dealing with practices such as labor or slave
labor in other countries? What are the implications associated with each of these options?

(1) Option – Stop trading

(1) Implication – Economic & clientele losses for business, unhappy customers, political
tensions for governments

(2) Option – Intervention to aid those developing countries in order to avoid child
slavery.

(2) Implication – Investment by governments and some business, good to the eyes of
customers

3. How would international trade theorists view the fair-trade movement?

 They would view the fair- trade movement in a very controversial way, because even if
developed nations helped developing nations, in this case, they intervene in order for to help
governments to stop child-slavery, but those governments are not reformed, they are still
vulnerable and become depended from developed countries, then again the circle begins. It
would be like the case on Iraq right now, its government wasn’t reformed and now a civil war
have upraised, now US is going to have to intervene again.

The theorist might end suggesting to stop trading with those countries, and instead look
for other countries where they labor practices are fair to the WTO and UNICEF.