{"claim_id":"C01","claim":"François-Louis Cailler opened a mechanised chocolate factory in Corsier near Vevey in 1819.","evidence":"Chocosuisse dates Cailler's factory to 1819.","source_url":"https://www.chocosuisse.ch/en/swiss-chocolate/history","source_type":"authoritative-secondary","source_date":"2026-07-16","retrieved_at":"2026-07-16T00:00:00Z","support":"direct","status":"verified","notes":"Undated source; date is access date."}
{"claim_id":"C01","claim":"François-Louis Cailler opened a mechanised chocolate factory in Corsier near Vevey in 1819.","evidence":"The federal Swiss chocolate overview identifies Cailler as a nineteenth-century pioneer and places the first factories around Lake Geneva.","source_url":"https://www.aboutswitzerland.eda.admin.ch/en/chocolate","source_type":"authoritative-secondary","source_date":"2026-02-01","retrieved_at":"2026-07-16T00:00:00Z","support":"direct","status":"verified","notes":"Page shown as published about five months before retrieval."}
{"claim_id":"C02","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.","source_url":"https://www.chocosuisse.ch/en/swiss-chocolate/history","source_type":"authoritative-secondary","source_date":"2026-07-16","retrieved_at":"2026-07-16T00:00:00Z","support":"direct","status":"verified","notes":"Undated source; date is access date."}
{"claim_id":"C02","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":"The Swiss FDFA identifies Peter's use of Nestlé condensed milk and Lindt's conching machine as key innovations.","source_url":"https://www.aboutswitzerland.eda.admin.ch/en/chocolate","source_type":"authoritative-secondary","source_date":"2026-02-01","retrieved_at":"2026-07-16T00:00:00Z","support":"direct","status":"verified","notes":"Page shown as published about five months before retrieval."}
{"claim_id":"C03","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.","source_url":"https://www.chocosuisse.ch/en/swiss-chocolate/history","source_type":"authoritative-secondary","source_date":"2026-07-16","retrieved_at":"2026-07-16T00:00:00Z","support":"direct","status":"verified","notes":"Undated source; date is access date."}
{"claim_id":"C03","claim":"Swiss chocolate became strongly export-oriented after 1900 and remains so today.","evidence":"The Swiss FDFA reports that the leading manufacturers produced more than 209,000 tonnes in 2024 and sold 72% abroad.","source_url":"https://www.aboutswitzerland.eda.admin.ch/en/chocolate","source_type":"primary","source_date":"2026-02-01","retrieved_at":"2026-07-16T00:00:00Z","support":"direct","status":"verified","notes":"Page shown as published about five months before retrieval; 2024 statistic."}
{"claim_id":"C04","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.","source_url":"https://www.landesmuseum.ch/en/exhibitions/temporary/2024/colonial/colonial-content","source_type":"authoritative-secondary","source_date":"2024-10-01","retrieved_at":"2026-07-16T00:00:00Z","support":"direct","status":"verified","notes":"Exhibition source published in 2024; exact page date not displayed."}
{"claim_id":"C04","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":"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_url":"https://www.swissinfo.ch/eng/best-of-srg-content/how-switzerland-became-known-as-the-land-of-chocolate/90699134","source_type":"independent","source_date":"2026-01-01","retrieved_at":"2026-07-16T00:00:00Z","support":"direct","status":"verified","notes":"Page shown as published about six months before retrieval."}
{"claim_id":"C05","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.","source_url":"https://www.landesmuseum.ch/en/exhibitions/temporary/2024/colonial/colonial-content","source_type":"authoritative-secondary","source_date":"2024-10-01","retrieved_at":"2026-07-16T00:00:00Z","support":"direct","status":"verified","notes":"Exhibition source published in 2024; exact page date not displayed."}
{"claim_id":"C05","claim":"Swiss actors were involved in transatlantic slavery and slave-labour plantations, despite Switzerland not having formal overseas colonies.","evidence":"Swissinfo reports Swiss individuals and companies profited from slavery through investment, trading, slave dealing, and plantation ownership.","source_url":"https://www.swissinfo.ch/eng/history/switzerland-and-its-colonists/45946742","source_type":"independent","source_date":"2020-08-18","retrieved_at":"2026-07-16T00:00:00Z","support":"direct","status":"verified"}
{"claim_id":"C06","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.","source_url":"https://www.landesmuseum.ch/en/exhibitions/temporary/2024/colonial/colonial-content","source_type":"authoritative-secondary","source_date":"2024-10-01","retrieved_at":"2026-07-16T00:00:00Z","support":"direct","status":"verified","notes":"Exhibition source published in 2024; exact page date not displayed."}
{"claim_id":"C06","claim":"Basel's colonial-era cocoa trading connected Swiss commerce to the Gold Coast and exploited unequal market power over producers.","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.","source_url":"https://edoc.unibas.ch/entities/publication/13de441c-4d53-4a9f-8249-f3d0f9249195","source_type":"authoritative-secondary","source_date":"2021-01-01","retrieved_at":"2026-07-16T00:00:00Z","support":"indirect","status":"verified"}
{"claim_id":"C07","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.","source_url":"https://www.landesmuseum.ch/en/exhibitions/temporary/2024/colonial/colonial-content","source_type":"authoritative-secondary","source_date":"2024-10-01","retrieved_at":"2026-07-16T00:00:00Z","support":"direct","status":"verified","notes":"This supports a limitation, not exoneration of individual actors."}
{"claim_id":"C07","claim":"A blanket assertion that all early Swiss chocolate firms were directly funded by slavery is not established by the reviewed evidence.","evidence":"Swissinfo characterises Switzerland's benefit from colonial structures as indirect in its history of chocolate overview.","source_url":"https://www.swissinfo.ch/eng/best-of-srg-content/how-switzerland-became-known-as-the-land-of-chocolate/90699134","source_type":"independent","source_date":"2026-01-01","retrieved_at":"2026-07-16T00:00:00Z","support":"indirect","status":"verified","notes":"The report's conclusion is limited to the evidence reviewed, not a definitive firm-by-firm finding."}
{"claim_id":"C08","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.","source_url":"https://www.norc.org/content/dam/norc-org/pdfs/NORC%202020%20Cocoa%20Report_English.pdf","source_type":"authoritative-secondary","source_date":"2020-10-01","retrieved_at":"2026-07-16T00:00:00Z","support":"direct","status":"verified"}
{"claim_id":"C08","claim":"Labour exploitation remains a material present-day risk in the West African cocoa sector.","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.","source_url":"https://www.cocoainitiative.org/sites/default/files/reports/ici-annual-report-2024_en.pdf","source_type":"authoritative-secondary","source_date":"2025-01-01","retrieved_at":"2026-07-16T00:00:00Z","support":"direct","status":"verified","notes":"Annual report titled 2024; surfaced in 2025."}