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Nestlé introduces Europe’s first KitKat that has been crafted from cocoa grown by farmer families from its Income Accelerator programme.
Nestlé UK and Ireland has shared that the first KitKat made with cocoa mass from beans grown by farmer families engaged in the company’s income accelerator is being launched in Europe.
The company states that this KitKat “aims to connect consumers with the farmers in Nestlé’s programme and raise awareness about the sustainability of the cocoa”.
The Income Accelerator programme launched in January 2022, was designed to “help close the living income gap of cocoa-farming families and reduce child labour risk”, but it doesn’t stop there. Nestlé also highlights that it endeavors to advance better agriculture practices and promote gender equality, empowering women as agents for positive change.
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The programme has so far supported more than 10,000 families in Côte d’Ivoire and is expanding to Ghana this year to include a total of 30,000 families, according to the company. It has plans for the programme to reach an estimated 160,000 cocoa-farming families in Nestlé’s global cocoa supply chain by 2030.
Turning to the product itself, the company has shared that it has been collaborating with various partners and suppliers to “transform its global cocoa sourcing and achieve full traceability and physical segregation of the cocoa sourced from its income accelerator programme”. Nestlé says that this has allowed it to track the entire journey of cocoa beans from origin to factory, keeping them physically separated from other cocoa sources.
The company has plans to use segregated cocoa butter by mid-2024, for all of its KitKat chocolate in Europe, and noted it is looking into expanding to other regions in the coming years.
Corinne Gabler, Head of Confectionery and Ice Cream at Nestlé said that KitKat has consistently embraced innovation, centered around its iconic ‘Have a break, Have a KitKat’ and today, this innovation is brought to life through the ‘Breaks for Good’ initiative that puts cocoa farmers at the centre of the product through our income accelerator programme.
She said they could not think of a better brand than KitKat to represent their efforts to create meaningful impact in cocoa communities.
From January 2024, The “Breaks for Good” KitKat will be available in stores across 27 European countries while the product will be available in the UK and Ireland from May 2024. A limited-edition KitKat, with 70% dark chocolate that is also made with cocoa sourced from the income accelerator, has in addition, been launched in the UK market as a pilot.
The approach showcases the potential for progressive change in the industry.
