Our living income analysis We have included a living income analysis of our cocoa supply chain in our annual Impact Report since 2022/23, gradually evolving the level of analysis carried out, focusing only on the proportion of farmers’ incomes from cocoa. Whilst our ultimate ambition is to report on living income data for all partner cooperatives, we currently focus our analysis on 3 of our longest-term partner cooperatives in Côte d’Ivoire: those which are in their second MoU or beyond, from whom we buy a significant volume of their total cocoa production, and which have reliable income data, therefore leading to more robust findings. Read more about the criteria for inclusion in analysis here.
WHAT IS A LIVING INCOME ANALYSIS? A living income analysis uses an established living income benchmark (in this case, set by the Living Income Community of Practice using the Anker methodology and updated by Fairtrade) along with farmer data to estimate how many farmers are reaching a living income. The existing benchmark is tailored to an appropriate and accurate household size and structure, for a supply chain or region, based on OECD- modified equivalency scales. • Fairtrade’s 2025 update estimates that the costs of decent living for a typical 7-member household with 4 adults and 3 children (OECD equivalency of 3.4) in Côte d’Ivoire is currently (West African CFA franc) 4,899,628 XOF/year (approximately 7,469 Euros/year). • Tony’s Open Chain adjusted this benchmark in line with our typical 6-member household size of 3 adults and 3 children (OECD equivalency of 2.9) in Côte d’Ivoire. This adjusts our benchmark to 4179102.05 XOF/year (approximately 6,371 Euros/ year). • Tony’s Open Chain then focus on the proportion of the benchmark (60%) that represents farmer’s cocoa income, based on multi-year supply chain data on the median percentage of income that farmers earn from cocoa. 40 Our model is built on validated, highly accurate data on the volumes of cocoa sourced by Tony’s Open Chain. However, most partner cooperatives sell only part of their cocoa to Tony’s Open Chain as they also work with other buyers. To reflect this, we estimate non-Tony’s Open Chain volumes using cooperative-reported percentages sold to others. 41 This gives a more complete picture of a farmer’s cocoa income and helps avoid under-reporting on living income (which would occur if we focused solely on Tony’s Open Chain volumes for partner cooperatives with multiple buyers). In line with our goal of including more partner cooperatives in future analyses, we tested calculations for 2 additional long-term partner cooperatives. These partner cooperatives did not meet the criteria for total volume or percentage of volume to Tony’s Open Chain for inclusion this year. 42 Adding these 2 cooperatives shifts the percentage of farmers earning a living income from 40.6% to 36%. Our initial analysis suggests this is because of the lower volumes of cocoa sold to Tony’s Open Chain, with less impact on living income overall as a result. We’re working towards more robust insights and are carefully considering how we include more partner cooperatives in next year’s living income analysis, while remaining mindful of potential data inaccuracies.
In 2024/25, we revised our methodology and updated our analytical model.
• Scale. We moved from basing the analysis on a sample of cocoa farmers in a survey to covering all cocoa farmers who delivered to Tony’s Open Chain across the 3 partner cooperatives in scope for the 2024/25 analysis. • Transitioning to a partial aggregation approach. We combine real data with median values to estimate outcomes for each cocoa farmer and across the entire supply chain. This hybrid approach enables tailored estimates while maintaining consistency. Our focus is on identifying overall trends and changes, rather than tracking individual farmers. • Gender disaggregation. We now include gender disaggregation as part of the living income analysis, provided partner cooperatives list gender in their farmer registers. Gender analysis was not possible under the previous approach due to the sample of women farmers generally being too small for meaningful or accurate comparisons. • A more accurate cost of production estimation based on real supply chain data. We are broadly aligned with Fairtrade’s LIRP costs of production, including for input costs per hectare, variable costs per hectare, and fixed costs. We differ for hired labour. Instead of using a daily wage and estimating the number of days for hired labour, we use real data from partner cooperatives on the actual cost of key activities per land unit (hectare or acre) for a healthy farm each season. We have used the median cost reported by partner cooperatives. • Accounting for self-produced food as a contribution to the living income benchmark. The updated 2025 Fairtrade LIRP provides a useful framework for considering the impact of self-produced food on living income. We have adopted this concept into the Tony’s Open Chain model, as recommended in the World Cocoa Foundation’s Cocoa Household Income Study Methodology. 39
39. World Cocoa Foundation. Cocoa Household Income Study Methodology. World Cocoa Foundation. 40. We carried out annual household surveys between 2019 – 2023 using the Multi-dimensional Poverty Index and other metrics to explore this data point on proportion of income from cocoa sources and from non-cocoa sources, resulting in high-quality multi-year data tailored to our own supply chain. We share more of our MPI findings in this public report and we make the anonymised dataset available for further analysis here. 41. The 3 partner cooperatives included in the analysis sell between 54 -100% of their volumes to Tony’s Open Chain. We assume a small premium for non-Tony’s Open Chain volumes based on publicly available data on minimum differentials and premiums paid. 42. Read more on our criteria for inclusion here.
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Ending exploitation in cocoa together
Living income
Climate, environment & productivity
Human rights
Governance & finances
Interesting appendices
Scaling for change
Introduction
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