Ferrero eyes traceability system for hazelnuts

Italy’s Ferrero is setting up a traceability system for the hazelnuts it uses in flagship brands like Ferrero Rocher chocolates and Nutella spread, with the help of Sourcemap.

The move comes after the company has come under scrutiny from human rights group who have claimed that some of the hazelnuts used in its products may have been picked by children working in farms in Turkey, or Syrian refugees who lack protection against exploitation at work.

Ferrero buys roughly a third of of all the hazelnuts it uses in its product in Turkey, where there are there are currently around 470,000 officially registered hazelnut farmers. In the past, it has acknowledged the difficulty in monitoring its sources and pledged to “prevent and eliminate child labour all along our supply chains.”

The company says that using the Sourcemap platform will allow it to “collect key data on social and agricultural practices [and] validate the value chain through data science.”

Image by Ritesh Tamrakar from Pixabay