By Melinda

Chocolate!  This is my favorite subject besides ‘green'. Chocolate is always a great gift for Mother's Day!  What a better gift for mom than guilt free chocolate!  When I say guilt free chocolate, I don't mean calorie and fat free.  I mean child slave labor free, pesticide free, organically produced, sustainably produced, and ethically produced.  Organic and fair trade chocolate supports local communities and maintains the Rainforest with its surrounding eco-systems.  It is not hard to find this type of chocolate now a days, and pretty easy to order online.  You can even get bite size pieces and truffles!  Check out the Green Guide's Shopper's List.

The Green Guide explains the differences between organic, fair trade, and Rainforest Alliance certifications. For me, I decided it is better to have both the organic and fair trade certification, but if you can't get both, go with fair trade.  My reasoning is this:  under organic certification, they don't use agrochemicals but, it does not appear to require the plantations to use shade trees so I suspect the plants could be grown on clear cut rainforest. Fair trade requires use of shade grown cocoa when planted in the rainforest area, they don't use illegal pesticides, and they use integrated pest management.  Fair trade also prevents the use of child slave labor and pays farmers fair wages. The Rainforest Alliance (RA) certification will allow agrochemical use if deemed necessary.  It also only requires a minimum of 30% of the cocoa content to be RA certified.  So, I assume you could get a chocolate bar with 70% cocoa uncertified from who knows where, while 30% is RA certified.  Here are my picks from their list: (check out Sweet Earth and Global Exchange for Truffles)

The Art Bar (organic & fair trade)
Found at: Whole Foods and Global Exchange Online