Addressing Social Desirability Bias When Measuring Child Labor Use: An Application to Cocoa Farms in Côte d'Ivoire.

This article focuses on measuring the prevalence of child labor on cocoa farms in Côte d'Ivoire certified as free of child labor, using the list experiment (LE) method to address social desirability bias. Surveying 4,458 certified cocoa farmers, the study finds that approximately 24 percent employed children under 16 for harvesting and pod-breaking, 21 percent for farm preparation, and 25 percent hired and paid children for any farm tasks—figures roughly double those obtained through direct questioning. The LE method, despite its higher cognitive demands, was well understood by farmers with low education levels, and estimates remained robust across design variations and recall periods. These findings suggest that certified cocoa farms continue to rely on child labor despite prohibitions, raising concerns about the effectiveness of certification schemes and monitoring systems in reducing hazardous child labor in the sector.