Fair Trade: a change in the world
Welcome to Fair Trade! A powerful way to make a change for the better on the world while getting outstanding products for yourself: the best chocolate and coffee, nice clothes, jewelry, crafts...
It allows us who live in the "North" to make a difference in the lives of those who live in the "South", backing their efforts in producing quality items, raising their kids and caring for the environment. It's a fantastic opportunity to support Justice, that is, help to bring Peace to our world.
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| Fighting poverty. Photo by C. Guthier |
In this kind of commerce, a central role is that of Fair Trading NGOs; they sustain producers by several means: granting them an agreed level of income, enough to make a living and to run community development projects, financing them before buying their harvest, providing market access and information...
One key aspect is that the price paid by these trading organizations to producers is higher than the average market one. It is never lower; if market prices rise, so do the Fair Trade ones.
Besides this decent wage and the Premium (an extra amount of money), Fair Trade involves encouraging labour rights, promoting women participation, providing market information to producers, seeking to create a long-term commitment and, above all, looking to empower people to take care of themselves, thus making an outstanding frame for a peaceful life.
Every kind of commerce has three main actors: producers, traders and buyers. You can be quite easily on the buyer's side; a quite important one, because if there are no customers there is no commerce, be it Fair or not!.
We, as individuals, can fight poverty just by shopping. Can you think of an easier way? Furthermore, producers in the South are not receiving donations: they can feel proud of their quality products and sell them accordingly.
We have a powerful tool in our hands to help reverse the effects of current cut-throat economy and start putting some humanness on it.
| Click to see how Fair Trade coffee is harvested |
Thanks for joining.
- Fair Trade chocolate
- Looking for a good Fair Trade chocolate? Well, there are many of them around; you may find here some useful hints
- history of Fair Trade
- Want to know about the history of Fair Trade? You have hit the right page!.
- a Fair Trade directory
- A Fair Trade directory of interesting websites of NGOs, traders and producers in Fair Trade
- Fair Trade coffee
- Fair Trade coffee is the flagship of the Fair Trade movement; the product which the highest impact on producers' living conditions, as it affects millions of people
| News & Events |
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| World Fairtrade Breakfast will take place soon! Maybe you can join one of the events. more... |
| Fairtrade Fortnight run from 23 February to 8 March, did you join? more... |
| Goodbye IFAT! Long life WFTO! more... |
| Welcome to the largest Fairtrade city! London has got it on October 23rd more... |
| An interesting conference, "Tackling Poverty Through Fair Trade", took place on past October 12th at the European Parliament more... |
| World's largest coffee break record was set! Last May 10th, 12.128 people across 150 places joined for it. more... |
| Researchers and professionals have gathered on the 3rd International Symposium, held in Montpellier (France) on May 14th. more... |
| The 2008 World Fair Trade Day has been celebrated all around the globe on May 10th. more... |
| Have you seen the FairTrade Layer available on Google Earth? Switch it on in your next visit to this nice program! |
