ILRF and its partners are releasing new reports on labor rights violations of sugar workers in El Salvador, Guatemala, Costa Rica and Nicaragua. Over 1500 cane cutters and sugar refinery workers were interviewed throughout these countries. The research for these reports was conducted in early 2005 and thus reflects recent and ongoing abuses of workers in the Central American sugar industry.
Major US chocolate makers, including M&M/Mars, Hershey's and others, have asked to join the US Customs Service as defendants in a human rights suit that demands the US government enforce its own trade laws prohiting the importation of goods made with child/slave labor.