From the perfect chocolate recipe to women’s empowerment

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Women Farmers

From the perfect chocolate recipe to women’s empowerment

Story
We’ve been working together with our customer Edward Marc Chocolatier to transform the livelihoods of women cocoa farmers across West Africa. The venture is showing that sustainability is not only supporting communities and the environment but also makes business sense.

Forever Chocolate target: 100% sustainable ingredients in all of our products by 2025.

Having perfected the chocolate coating recipe for our client, Pittsburgh-based Edward Marc Chocolatier, in 2015, we introduced them to our HORIZONS range of products that directly supports sustainable, entrepreneurial farming, improved productivity and community development including a focus on female farmers. The mission of our Cocoa Horizons Foundation instantly resonated with Edward Marc’s own sustainability values and the championing of women entrepreneurs as it is a Certified Women Owned Business.

Cocoa Horizons’ mission: to improve the livelihoods of cocoa farmers and their communities through the promotion of sustainable, entrepreneurial farming, improved productivity, and community development.

Scaling up

Edward Marc not only became a HORIZONS customer, but it also became the first customer in North America to include the HORIZONS logo on its entire portfolio. Fast forward two years and the company is now sponsoring a project designed to help women in Côte d’Ivoire adopt sustainable and productive agroforestry methods. Working initially with six women in 2017, the objective is to expand year-on-year.

Given our place in the chocolate industry and the fact that we are a Certified Women Owned Business ourselves, we feel that supporting women cocoa farmers is our best way to pay it forward.
Dana Edwards Manatos, Vice President, Edward Marc Chocolatier
Edward Marc Chocolatier
Christiaan Prins

Christiaan Prins

VP Corporate Communications for Barry Callebaut. Believer in the urgent business case for sustainability. Married, father of two. Ph.D. in political science. Cyclist, sailer and Fender Strat player.

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