Palm oil — it’s a key ingredient in products likely sitting in your home, including shampoo, detergent, chocolate, instant noodles, even lipstick. FGV, one of the world’s largest producers of palm oil and joint venture partner of Procter & Gamble, is under fire for forced labor on their palm oil plantations in Malaysia. FGV claims to have cleaned up its act, but there is no prooof or independent verification of this.
This is where US Customs comes in — they can provide greater transparency on what’s happening on the ground.
Just this week, they sent a team to Ivory Coast who are investigating forced and child labor in the cocoa industry. The move came after a global outcry over the failure of massive chocolate brands to clean up abuses
“The travesty of forced child labor in the global supply chain cannot be solved by chocolate companies’ self-regulation,” wrote two US Senators.