claim: François-Louis Cailler opened a mechanised chocolate factory in Corsier near Vevey in 1819.

evidence: Chocosuisse dates Cailler's factory to 1819.

source_type: authoritative-secondary

support: direct

status: verified

notes: Undated source; date is access date.


evidence: The federal Swiss chocolate overview identifies Cailler as a nineteenth-century pioneer and places the first factories around Lake Geneva.

notes: Page shown as published about five months before retrieval.


claim: Milk chocolate and conching were major Swiss production innovations: Daniel Peter succeeded with milk chocolate in 1875 and Rodolphe Lindt developed conching in 1879.

evidence: Chocosuisse gives these dates and describes the innovations.


evidence: The Swiss FDFA identifies Peter's use of Nestlé condensed milk and Lindt's conching machine as key innovations.


claim: Swiss chocolate became strongly export-oriented after 1900 and remains so today.

evidence: Chocosuisse says the industry boomed from the end of the nineteenth century and that chocolate became an important export article after 1900.


evidence: The Swiss FDFA reports that the leading manufacturers produced more than 209,000 tonnes in 2024 and sold 72% abroad.

source_type: primary

notes: Page shown as published about five months before retrieval; 2024 statistic.


claim: Swiss chocolate's rise depended on cocoa supplied through colonial-era trade systems in which cocoa was produced under enslavement and other unequal relations.

evidence: The Swiss National Museum says cocoa was harvested by enslaved people and traded internationally, including by Swiss trading companies, and that Swiss chocolate depended on colonial cocoa and dairy growth.

notes: Exhibition source published in 2024; exact page date not displayed.


evidence: Swissinfo reports that Swiss chocolate flourished during the colonial era and Switzerland benefited indirectly from colonial structures, including early cocoa plantations supported by British colonial authorities.

source_type: independent

notes: Page shown as published about six months before retrieval.


claim: Swiss actors were involved in transatlantic slavery and slave-labour plantations, despite Switzerland not having formal overseas colonies.

evidence: The Swiss National Museum records more than 250 Swiss entrepreneurs and companies involved in deportation/trade of roughly 172,000 people, and Swiss private ownership of slave-labour plantations from the seventeenth century.


evidence: Swissinfo reports Swiss individuals and companies profited from slavery through investment, trading, slave dealing, and plantation ownership.


claim: Basel's colonial-era cocoa trading connected Swiss commerce to the Gold Coast and exploited unequal market power over producers.

evidence: The Swiss National Museum says the Basel Missions-Handlungs-Gesellschaft traded and grew cocoa, and that its cartel position kept producer prices low and hindered African competitors.


evidence: University of Basel's open repository records Andrea Franc's study of the Basel Trading Company's cocoa trade with the Gold Coast from 1893 to 1960.

support: indirect


claim: A blanket assertion that all early Swiss chocolate firms were directly funded by slavery is not established by the reviewed evidence.

evidence: The National Museum says whether Switzerland as a nation grew rich from colonial involvement is difficult to determine, while individual companies and families certainly benefited.

notes: This supports a limitation, not exoneration of individual actors.


evidence: Swissinfo characterises Switzerland's benefit from colonial structures as indirect in its history of chocolate overview.

notes: The report's conclusion is limited to the evidence reviewed, not a definitive firm-by-firm finding.


claim: Labour exploitation remains a material present-day risk in the West African cocoa sector.

evidence: NORC estimated 1.56 million children in cocoa child labour and 1.48 million exposed to hazardous child labour across Côte d'Ivoire and Ghana in 2018/19.


evidence: ICI's 2024 annual report describes active forced-labour risk management work and says forced labour remains a critical human-rights concern in cocoa-growing communities across West Africa.

notes: Annual report titled 2024; surfaced in 2025.