Fair Trade: Part III- The Concept

What is Fair Trade?
"Fair trade is an organized social movement and market-based approach to alleviating global poverty and promoting sustainability. The movement advocates the payment of a fair price as well as social and environmental standards in areas related to the production of a wide variety of goods. It focuses in particular on exports from developing countries to developed countries, most notably handicrafts, coffee, cocoa, sugar, tea, bananas, honey, cotton, wine, fresh fruit, and flowers."
When we shop Fair Trade, the people in the developing countries who make the product we buy are working under fair conditions and are receiving a fair wage. This promotes sustainability and allows them to bring themselves out of extreme poverty, rather than relying on donations.

How do I know if I am buying Fair Trade?
If you are buying Fair Trade, it will be certified by one of the Fair Trade federations. The most common is the International Fairtrade Certified mark, which is green and blue and pictured above. It is used in over 50 countries and is owned and protected by FLO International. TransFair USA and TransFair Canada are also used, and their certified mark shows a black and white silhouette of a person.

Listed below are several Fair Trade organizations for you to look into:

Starbucks: Ask for Cafe Estima. They are not brewing it all the time, so you may have to ask for it specially. They also sell Ethos Water, where with every purchase, Ethos Water will contribute US $0.05 (C$0.10 in Canada) toward our goal of raising at least US $10 million by 2010.

Seven Shores Trading: Owners Sean and Amy Zister have traveled, taught and lived in many countries around the world. They started Seven Shores Trading Co Inc in November 2004 as they were inspired from the artisans they met throughout their journeys. They knew that one way to help eliminate world poverty was to help create fair trade sustainable incomes for these artisans by selling their time honoured handiwork from their store in Kitchener-Waterloo, Ontario.

Revive Fair Trade: Revive is an independent boutique offering fair trade products (clothing, accessories, and more!) for men, women, kids, and home.

Ten Thousand Villages: Ten Thousand Villages provides vital, fair income to Third World people by marketing their handicrafts and telling their stories in North America. Ten Thousand Villages works with artisans who would otherwise be unemployed or underemployed. This income helps pay for food, education, health care and housing. Ten Thousand Villages is a nonprofit program of Mennonite Central Committee, the relief and development agency of Mennonite and Brethren in Christ churches in North America.

Marigold: Marigold is an official member of the Fair Trade Federation, offering fashionable clothes and household items from a women’s co-op from the slums of Mumbai, India. Our products represent a unique blend of Indian handicraft and modern fashion that fit well and are stunning in design. Our beautiful line features products that are vegetable dyed and block printed, preserving an age-old artisan tradition while supporting the environment. A purchase of Marigold’s products also ensures a fair wage for the women producers, helping them to become more economically self-sufficient.

Cocoa Camino: Cocoa Camino is a line of premium Fair Trade Certified and certified organic chocolate, cocoa and sugar products produced by La Siembra Co-operative. La Siembra’s mission is to offer high-quality Fair Trade Certified organic products that improve the livelihoods of family farmers and the well-being of communities at home and abroad.

Butterfly Mama: Our goal is to give back to the planet, the people & animals. We strive to replenish the earth's resources - giving back more than we take, supporting and encouraging human welfare through Fair Trade and supporting animal rights & encouraging animal protection.

No Sweat: No Sweat is the pioneer of fair trade fashion and footwear, setting an empowered, unionized workforce as the gold standard for fair trade clothing. We market direct to consumers via the internet, through our network of independent retailers and by custom orders to wholesale customers. We provide a competitively priced fairly traded product to you and a living wage to our workers. How? By not advertising. We rely on you to help us spread the word! To see how, go to Globalize THIS. It’s our world. Let’s change it.

Global Mamas: By purchasing fair trade Global Mamas products, you are offering sustainable livelihoods to women and their families living in poverty. All proceeds go directly to the women and to nonprofit programs that assist them with business development. Join the community of Global Mamas who care about the world and the future.

Pura Vida: When you buy Pura Vida Coffee, you get more than a great cup of coffee. Our premium beans, hand-roasted in small batches, provide unsurpassed flavor and fullness. Because Pura Vida specializes in Fair Trade and organic coffee, you help a farmer sustain his family and protect the environment with every cup you drink.

Nosilla: We make fun, quality clothing for your baby while respecting our social and environmental responsibility. Here you will find style and sustainability.

Fair Indigo: We are a new clothing company with a different way of doing business. With years of experience working for major clothing brands, a small group of us left our jobs determined to pioneer a change in the apparel industry. We wanted to create stylish, high-quality clothes while paying a fair and meaningful wage to the people who produce them. It’s a concept known as “fair trade” and it means we put people first.

Adili: Adili brings together a community of producers, designers and customers who believe that fashion can be both stylish and ethical. Adili is the Swahili word for 'ethical and just'. Adili.com offers the best brands in the ethical fashion market. You can buy clothes that will benefit the people involved in their production or the environment, and in many cases, both. Adili.com sells Women's and Children's clothes and accessories. Our ranges of Organic Clothing and Fair Trade Clothing include Organic Jeans, Fair Trade T-Shirts and much more.

Greater Goods: We are dedicated to working with fair trade producers from around the world. Our suppliers import jewelry, clothing, sweaters, accessories, prayer flags and paper products from Nepal since 1985. Connections with African importers for masks and carvings, textiles and clothing from South and Central America and from India fill our store with a wide variety of ethnic goods that are fairly traded and quality made.

Lilidom: Fairtrade children's clothes. Fair trade is aimed to reduce the inequalities in the world and to encourage economic and social development in developing countries. Fair trade today allows more than 5 million families to gain a respectable living and this number continues to grow thanks to our contributions.

Just Shirts: This amazing company has fair trade clothing made from a single mothers group in El Salvador. They not only pay them fairly, but also do special things for the women and their families like Christmas parties and a trip to the beach!