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[Mindy D]

Quoted from “The Telegraph”

The nuts – 60 per cent of which are processed in India – are exceptionally hard to extract. A cashew has two layers of hard shell between which are caustic substances – cardol and anacardic acid – which can cause vicious burns.

Many of the women who work in the cashew industry have permanent damage to their hands from this corrosive liquid, because factories do not routinely provide gloves. For their pains they earn about 160 rupees for a 10-hour day: £1.70.

Some Indian cashew workers have had enough. Last month 17,000 of them went on strike, demanding a 70 per cent pay increase. This will force up Indian export prices, but consumers in Europe may be unaffected, as Vietnamese cashew production increases apace.

Conditions in Vietnam may be even worse than in India. Cashews are sometimes shelled by drug addicts in forced labour camps, who are beaten and subjected to electric shocks. Time magazine has described this trade as “blood cashews”.”

Source. https://www.telegraph.co.uk/foodanddrink/foodanddrinknews/11577928/Blood-cashews-the-toxic-truth-abo...