They have to pick the coffee beans by hand and then the heavy task of bringing the beans to a weighing station follows. The documentary will be broadcast on British Channel 4 on Monday, but in British media is being written about it today.
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The children would work on the plantations for eight hours, sometimes six days a week. They do not earn more than 6 euros a day. Clooney has been the face of the coffee brand with the cups for years and reportedly made tens of millions of euros with it.
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In a response, Clooney says he is “surprised and sad.” He did not expect this news. The 58-year-old actor is in the advisory board for sustainability of Nespresso, which aims to improve the life of coffee farmers. “It is clear that the advisory board and this company still have to do work, and that work will be done,” so late he know.
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Nespresso informs RTL News that it has started an investigation. For the time being, it will no longer buy coffee beans from plantations in parts of Guatemala.
According to the management, the company has a zero tolerance policy when it comes to child labor. According to the documentary makers, the coffee plantations in question would also supply coffee beans to Starbucks.
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Full response Nespresso
Nespresso has a zero tolerance policy when it comes to child labor. Child labor is unacceptable to Nespresso and this means that child labor is in no way tolerated in the supply chain.
Whenever there are accusations at odds with our high standard on this subject, we intervene immediately.
In this case, the English TV program Dispatches has informed Nespresso about child labor at six Rainforest Alliance certified coffee plantations in the region of Guatemala.
Unfortunately, Dispatches did not provide Nespresso with the necessary information about the coffee plantations that are needed to identify the coffee plantations that are being accused and thus determine whether these plantations actually supply coffee to Nespresso.
Nespresso naturally takes the accusations very seriously and has therefore taken action on several points:
- Thorough research is currently taking place in the region to find out which coffee plantations are involved and whether they actually deliver coffee to Nespresso
- Nespresso immediately stopped purchasing coffee from all coffee plantations in the region. The purchase of coffee from this region will not be resumed until it can be established with certainty that there is no question of child labor on plantations in this region
- Nespresso doubles the number of agricultural specialists in the region to support the execution of the research and visits to the plantations
- Nespresso will perform unannounced visits to coffee plantations in the region to further monitor compliance with social and labor issues
The above actions are in addition to the existing collaborations with farmers and partners in the region concerned and in the rest of the world.
Nespresso works together with Rainforest Alliance and Fairtrade to ensure good working conditions and the fair treatment of employees. All farms of the cooperatives in this region in Guatemala are Rainforest Alliance and Fairtrade certified.
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