Cadbury’s Dairy Milk awarded fairtrade certification

Cadbury’s Dairy Milk chocolate bars are to be certified Fairtrade.

It is the first mass-market chocolate brand to adopt the Fairtrade mark, and signals how important ethical credentials have become for consumers.

Three hundred million Dairy Milk bars will be certified Fairtrade by the end of the summer, at a cost of £1.5 million.

Cadbury is also making its packaged cocoa Fairtrade.

Todd Stitzer, Cadbury chief executive, said: “If there are only small players in Fairtrade, it’s sort of self-defeating.

“If big businesses get behind it, you can have a much greater impact on agricultural societies.”

In the past year Fairtrade sales in the UK have increased 40% to over £700 million.

Cadbury’s move to Fairtrade will add £200 million to this total.

It will also triple the amount of Fairtrade cocoa sold by Ghana’s cocoa farmers.

Fairtrade Foundation director Harriet Lamb said Cadbury’s move ‘throws down the gauntlet’ to other chocolate manufacturers.

“It’s an iconic British brand,” Lamb said. “This does really set the pace for the mainstream industry.”

She also called upon retailers to put ethical certification at the heart of their product choice policies.

Sainsbury’s, Co-op and Marks & Spencer now only stock Fairtrade tea and sugar for their own-brand products.

All bananas sold at Sainsbury’s and Waitrose are Fairtrade.

To gain Fairtrade certification, companies have to guarantee a minimum price for their suppliers, as well as paying a premium of $150 (£106) per tonne.