It's Fair Trade
As a leading source of income in the coffee growing regions and a highly valued commodity, coffee can be a powerful tool to bring about positive change for small farmers, the environment, and our health. For us to drink coffee as cheaply as we do, growers must be paid below market value for their green beans so that the middleman can turn a profit at each step from the field to the commodities markets to the table. Bean North offers farmers an alternative… a “fair price” for the coffee they grow.
It’s Pesticide Free
After tobacco, cotton and coffee are the second and third most chemically treated crops. Both are sprayed with pesticides, herbicides, and fungicides. These chemicals are health and environmental hazards that affect not only the growers, their families, and the land and water, but also us – the consumer. Organic agriculture focuses on building healthy soil. Through composting, intercropping (shade trees) and natural pest controls, a whole system of compatible, sustainable agriculture is used to grow healthier crops.
It’s Grown by Stewards of the Land
The fair trade movement focuses on small scale farmers who in our mind are the best stewards of the land. These farmers grow their coffee under the forest canopy. This involves planting a mixture of nitrogen-fixing trees with other useful species to provide shade. Shade trees protect the coffee plants from rain and sun, help maintain soil quality, reduce the need for weeding, and aid in pest control. They also provide extra income and are an additional food source for the farmers. Sustainability is of great concern to the farmers and their families, cooperatively they will make a difference.
Fair Trade FAQ
What is fair trade?
Fair trade is a system of exchange that seeks to create greater equity and partnership in international trading system by:
~ Paying fair wages in local context;
~ Supporting participatory workplaces;
~ Ensuring environmental sustainability;
~ Supplying financial and technical support;
~ Offering public accountability;
~ Respecting cultural identity;
~ Building direct and long-term relationships; and,
~ Educating consumers.
By approaching development as a whole process (rather than just a fair price), fair trade organizations cultivate partnerships with their suppliers and contribute to the development of communities. Fair trade is not about charity; it uses a fairer system of exchange to empower producers and to create sustainable, positive change.
What does that really mean?
Fair trade is about keeping prices affordable for consumers while returning a higher amount of the producers. This relationship is made by possible, because fair traders typically work directly with artisans and farmers, cutting out the middle men who increase the price at each level – enabling retail products to remain competitively priced in respect to their conventional counterparts, while more fairly compensating producers.
Fair trade makes a tremendous impact on communities. Children’s school fees are paid; nutritional needs met; health care costs are covered; the poor, especially women, are empowered; the environmental impact of production, sourcing, and transport is mitigated to the fullest extent possible. Such an impact is created, because fair trade approaches development as a holistic process.
Does fair trade make a difference?
In producer communities, schools are built, wells constructed, children attend school, and other signs clearly indicate that the income generated by fair trade sales positively resonate in a community. In intangible ways, one can note the impact of fair trade, as well. Cultural techniques are revived; women become valued members of their societies; alternative production methods preserve biodiversity; small and medium sized enterprises in the developing world increase their capacity. Through this and other evidence we know that lives have been positively changed, because of fair trade.
How does one know if a particular product or business is fair trade?
There are two types of organizations involved in fair trade. Some certify specific commodities, regardless of to whom they are sold; others screen organizations for their full commitment to fair trade, regardless of what products they sell. Member organizations of the Fair Trade Federation usually display the FTF logo on their business materials, are listed on the FTF website, and may have the words “Member of the Fair Trade Federation” on their products. The Fairtrade Labelling Organization and its North American affiliates, TransFair USA and TransFair Canada, allow their label on the products they have certified.
Written by Fair Trade Federation
www.fairtradefederation.org
