M.S. Global Affairs — Capstone Defense

ClearCart: A Source-Audited Product Integrity Score

Capstone deliverable presentation

Alex Du
M.S. Global Affairs — Global Economy concentration
Advisor: [ADVISOR]
[DATE]

The problem, in one number

Channel 4 Dispatches, Guatemala, 2020
Children on all twelve farms visited — seven supplying Nespresso, five supplying Starbucks.
ABC Impact x Nightline, Chiapas, 2022
Children as young as six on a Rainforest Alliance–certified farm.
Rainforest Alliance regional lead, on camera:
not all certified farms are inspected.
S1, S2

Market failure, research questions, client

Credence goods

Sustainability and labor claims cannot be verified before purchase, during use, or after the fact. The buyer never learns the true quality of what they bought.

Research questions

  1. [RQ1]
  2. [RQ2]
  3. [RQ3]
  4. [RQ4]
End user: [CLIENT]

Methodology I: the rubric

🌱 Planet 🤝 People & Supply Chain ⭐ Quality 💰 Value 🔍 Transparency

Traced example — Trader Joe's Organic Pasture Raised Eggs (1 dz)

ClaimPasture-raised / high welfare land use
→
SourceCertified Humane (HFAC)
→
Evidence type3rd-party certification
→
Confidence tierHigh
→
Pillar scorePlanet 86 / 100
  • No score without a source.
  • Every score carries a confidence tier — High is independently verified, Medium is a brand claim plus corroborating evidence, Low is inferred.

12 product types · 0–5 rubric · 39 references

Methodology II: the source pipeline

Source URL / transcript
→
Extraction
→
Per-pillar claims, evidence-typed
→
Gap markers
→
Attribution block
Output: claims, not scores.

The no-composite decision

iPhone 15 Pro — equal-weighted composite

DimensionScore
Environmental Sustainability0.20
Labor & Ethical Sourcing0.85
Product Quality & Durability0.78
Pricing Fairness0.75
Value for Money0.72
Corporate Ownership0.80
Sourcing Truthfulness & Credibility0.85
Consumer-Education Resources0.90
Performance (Geekbench)0.72
Expert Review (CNET)0.60
Net Promoter Score0.55
Composite (equal-weighted)0.71

Live example — Clarity Insight Advisory

de Buyer Mineral B Pro Carbon Steel
10 / 10
one of only two 10/10 ratings across 180+ cookware lines audited
People & Supply Chain: no data (gap) · Planet: brand-claim only
0.20
Planet
0.85
People
0.78
Quality
0.72
Value
0.85
Transparency

Finding 1: Awareness Index

Carbonated Soft DrinksEnvironment
BeerMonopoly
Salty SnacksHealth
Toilet PaperEnvironment
Paper TowelsEnvironment
CoffeeLabor
Laundry DetergentHealth
Bottled WaterMonopoly
Disposable DiapersEnvironment
Breakfast CerealHealth

Finding 2: The Pillar Coverage Gap

TODO — coverage matrix SVG 5 columns (pillars) x 3 rows (sources: Prudent Reviews, Clarity Insight Advisory, Fineas Jackson). Planet and People & Supply Chain columns empty.

Pilot audit — 3 sources profiled, 6 products assessed.

Finding 3: Market Concentration

Beer

AB InBev — 500+ brands globally, distribution lock-in on tap handles, wholesaler relationships, and retail shelf placement.

Cereal

~75% three-firm market concentration in packaged breakfast cereal.

Bottled Water

Markups up to 3,000×. Nestlé/BlueTriton pumped 130M+ gallons/year from Michigan wells for $200/year in extraction fees.

S6

Finding 4: Value Chain Distribution

TODO — waterfall chart, single bag of coffee Stages: retail price → roaster/brand margin → distributor/logistics → exporter → mill → smallholder farmer. Smallholder share labeled at 1–3% of retail price.
S3, S7

Finding 5: The Governance Gap

Certification bodies

  • Rainforest Alliance
  • Fairtrade
  • B Corp
non-state actors, no legal standing in producing jurisdictions
↑

Mandatory disclosure

  • CSRD
  • CSDDD
  • UFLPA
  • EU Green Claims Directive
binding, extraterritorial
S2, S4

The Deliverable

TODO — record demo video Narrate the three disclosure layers: badge pills on the product card, the expanded pillar panel, the full source breakdown. Poster frame: assets/demo-poster.png (also used as the PDF-export fallback frame).

Research library: alx-du.github.io/product-integrity-scorer

Contribution, Limitations, Close

A replicable, source-audited methodology for producing product-level integrity information, and documented evidence that neither certification schemes nor independent review media currently produce it.
  • LLM hallucination and overconfident scoring
  • Data availability varies by jurisdiction — confidence tiers are not comparable across origins
  • Individual purchasing is a weak lever against structural concentration