WEST BRIDGEWATER, MA - Equal Exchange announces today the introduction of their new line of three gourmet, organic, fairly traded chocolate bars. These bars are distinct for combining the famous Swiss standards for chocolate-making with the sourcing of ingredients in the most socially and environmentally responsible manner possible. The result is a win-win-win situation for chocolate lovers, for small farmers, and for the Earth.

Equal Exchange, already the nation's leader in fairly traded specialty coffee, is proud to offer this line of gourmet chocolate bars that bring the benefits of Equal Exchange's Fair Trade model to thousands of small-scale cocoa farmers in the Dominican Republic and Peru and to small-scale sugar growers in Costa Rica and Paraguay.

Thanks to Fair Trade these farmers receive a higher, more reliable price for their crops and gain critical support for their cooperatives - a key to broad-based, sustainable economic development in their communities. The Fair Trade certification system also guarantees for the consumer that no exploited child labor or slave labor was used on these farms, and that the standards of the International Labor Organization have been upheld. This contrasts to the yet-unresolved scandal involving child labor on West African cocoa farms, source of 70% of the world's cocoa.

In the U.S., food and beverages are Fair Trade Certifie^TM exclusively by TransFair USA, an independent, non-profit monitoring organization based in Oakland, California. www.transfairusa.org

100% of the ingredients, including the top grade cocoa beans, sugar, milk powder, almonds, and vanilla, are certified organic. USDA regulations for organic farming forbid the use of synthetic chemical herbicides, pesticides, fungicides, fertilizers, or the use of any genetically-modified crops. In Latin America, organic farming helps to provide farmers with a safer, non-toxic working environment. Organic cocoa farming also protects biodiversity and helps to maintain the winter habitat for millions of migratory song-birds. In dairy operations, organic certification forbids the use of bovine-growth hormones and the use of animal by-products in cattle feed.

Immediately after harvesting, these criollo, forestero, and trinitario cocoa beans are carefully fermented for six to ten days to bring out a richer cocoa flavor. This step is skipped with cocoa destined for mass-market products. The beans are then sun-dried for three days and painstakingly hand-sorted to ensure the desired taste profile and consistent quality.

DISTRIBUTION & BACKGROUND
Starting in October 2004 chocolate lovers will have three popular varieties of the 3.5 ounce bars to choose from: Milk Chocolate (38% cocoa); Dark Chocolate with Almonds (55% cocoa); and Very Dark Chocolate (71% cocoa). The suggested retail price is $2.99 each.

The chocolate bars will be available to retailers nationwide on October 1st through America's largest distributor of natural foods, United Natural Foods, Inc. www.unfi.com. On October 15th chocolate bars will become available to individual shoppers through Equal Exchange's online store (minimum order: one case of 12 bars) www.equalexchange.com.

Since Equal Exchange helped introduce Fair Trade to the nation's specialty coffee industry in 1986 Fair Trade has become an established segment of the coffee market, with a reputation for high quality. In recent years more than 200 U.S. coffee companies have adopted the practice, at least in part, and nationally Fair Trade coffee sales have been growing 60 to 100 percent annually. The Fair Trade model has also recently been adopted for the import of premium tea, cocoa, and fresh tropical fruits.

However, America's $13 billion chocolate industry has yet to adopt Fair Trade, despite the ready availability of high quality Fair Trade cocoa, and the industry's inability to date to resolve the continuing problems regarding child labor in cocoa farming.

"We believe that our new line of chocolate bars provides a positive example to others in the industry, and we hope that, through our success, these bars will spur others to imitate our Fair Trade model." - Rob Everts, Equal Exchange co-executive director

Equal Exchange, the pioneer and U.S. market leader in Fair Trade coffee since 1986, is a full service provider of high quality, organic coffee, tea, cocoa powder, hot cocoa mix and chocolate to retailers and food service establishments. Major customers include Kroger, Safeway, Shaw's, Stop & Shop, and Hannaford supermarkets, natural food stores, consumer food cooperatives, cafes and restaurants. 100% of Equal Exchange products are fairly traded, benefiting 27 small farmer cooperatives in 14 countries around the world. In keeping with its Fair Trade mission Equal Exchange is a worker cooperative, owned and democratically controlled by its employees.

(photo at left: Sr. Serpa, organic cocoa farmer and member of the CACVRA cooperative with Equal Exchange's co-executive director, Rob Everts, Rio Apurimac, Peru, August 2004.)

Equal Exchange

Equal Exchange

Equal Exchange, founded in 1986, is the worker-owned and governed co-operative who pioneered the Fair Trade concept in the U.S. coffee industry. They have since successfully expanded their Fair Trade program into the tea, cocoa, chocolate, sugar and healthy snack categories. Equal Exchange products are sold and served in thousands of locations nationwide, including supermarkets, natural food stores, cafés, and places of worship. Overall they now trade with 40 small-farmer co-operatives around the world, including 2 in the United States. With $25 million in annual sales, and 100+ employees, Equal Exchange has grown to be the nation's sixth largest worker co-op. It is their mission to continue to grow the Fair Trade market, and to demonstrate the contributions and viability of democratic worker co-operatives.

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