The article 32 of the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child states that:
“States recognize the right of the child to be protected from economic exploitation and from performing any work that is likely to be hazardous or to interfere with the child’s education, or to be harmful to the child’s health or physical, mental, spiritual, moral or social development”.
However, the International Labor Organization says that 250 million children under the age of 14 worldwide are forced to work. This number is not accurate as it is not so easy to obtain reliable information on child labor because there are no comprehensive statistics and in most cases the government and the companies refuse to admit their existence.
Child exploitation has a double-sided: it is both cause and consequence of poverty. In other words, child labor is developed by the people that must fight alone with their poverty.
Without that social solidarity that can satisfy at least their basic needs, with no school and free health care, families are forced to ask all members, including children, to work hard for their survival. We know that in nature the bigger eat the smaller with no mercy.
However, Plato sees things in another way: “I would prefer neither one nor the other; but, if necessary, or to do injustice, or suffer it, I would choose to suffer injustice rather than commit it”. According to this philosophy, people with good will try to develop strategies that allow the weakest men to get out of the vicious circle of hunger without being exploited by opportunists.
For example, fair trade is a system created to provide fair wages for workers that are able to guarantee their children a economic / cultural development. However, we must never forget that “only together we can achieve what each of us tries to achieve.”
Faced with this challenge, Caffè Pascucci chose not to remain indifferent and to buy exclusively from cooperatives who firmly reject the exploitation of children and workers in general.
The selected cooperatives in Guatemala are “San Francisco de Asis” of La Union and “Nuova Esperanza” of El Bosque.
The cooperative “San Francisco de Asis” was born in 2011 in La Union with the following objectives declared:
– To be a cooperative that seeks to improve the living standard of its members, co-workers, families and promoting the development of their community.
– Become a model for other organized groups of farmers who want to improve their living standard while preserving the environment, raising awareness, social justice, solidarity and ethical coherence.
The cooperative “Nuova Esperanza” of El Bosque has contributed to the construction of a new middle school, the birth of a new clinic, the construction of a public library, has provided support to two elementary schools as well as being with its headquarters a place of community work but also a place for meeting and participation in the community social life.
We watch directly both cooperatives from several years to ensure that workers are adequately paid and there are no instances of exploitation.
Caffè Pascucci has always been in the forefront of efforts for greater social justice and always controls that what buys and sells is not the result of injustice.
