Chocolate - one of life's guilty pleasures. But recent reports of child slave labour on African cocoa plantations have given the guilt aspect a whole new meaning.

An article by the Daily Telegraph's Rachel Baird warns, "Up to 40 percent of the chocolate we eat may be contaminated by slavery."

Ivory Coast is the world's biggest producer of cocoa beans with over a million cocoa farms and plantations. In 2001 a BBC documentary, "Slavery," claimed 90 percent of Ivory Coast cocoa plantations were using slave labour. Most are young men and boys from impoverished areas in Benin, Togo and Mali. They are enticed by traffickers who promise them paid work, housing and an education. Instead, they are sold to Ivory Coast cocoa plantation owners who beat them into submission and offer no pay for grueling, 18-hour days.

Big companies, like Nestle, purchase their cocoa on international exchanges where cocoa from Ivory Coast is mixed with cocoa from other countries and loses its identity as a slave-made product. Anti Slavery International says, "Because of the way the chocolate industry buys its cocoa it is not possible to ensure that slave or other forms of illegal exploitation have not been used in its production." It says, “the only way consumers can be confident the produce they use is free from exploited labour is by buying products which carry a Fairtrade label."

Fairtrade means products are purchased directly and at a fair price from small family growers and co-operatives that do not rely on hired or illegal forced labour. Growers receive a minimum guaranteed price that covers real production costs, regardless of how low world market prices fall.