With the new year, the German Initiative on Sustainable Cocoa (GISCO) is launching the two-year theme “Inclusive Strategies for Living Wages.”
The theme for the year was established during the strategy meeting on September 19, 2023. Living wage refers to the net income of a household at a specific location, which is sufficient to provide all members of the household with an adequate standard of living.
At the extraordinary general meeting of GISCO on June 23, 2023, the members adopted adjustments to goal 1 regarding living wages:
“GISCO members are jointly committed to constantly improving the income situation of cocoa farming households in the producing countries, so that all households can earn a living income. We are jointly committed to enable at least 90% of households, whose main occupation is cocoa cultivation and who supply members of German Initiative on Sustainable Cocoa with cocoa that is sold or processed in Germany, to earn a living income by 2030. Together we develop strategies to achieve this goal.”
What have we planned for 2024 to develop these strategies?
- Events for Exchange and Learning: Expert inputs and discussion on the role of gender in achieving living wages at the ISM in Cologne on January 28, 2024.
- General Assembly on May 14, 2024, in Berlin: Together with our guests, we will discuss how each member can contribute to closing the income gap.
- Internal Working Group Meetings: Promoting open exchange and learning among our members.
- ISCO Collaboration: Presence at the WCC 2024 in Brussels together with the ISCO secretariats to jointly shape the path to living wages.
- Self-Commitments: Publication of individual roadmaps of our members towards living wages by the end of 2024.
- Accountability: Publication of the monitoring report in the second half of the year with a focus on living wages.