The customer base for fair trade products in Canada has finally moved beyond the cliché of tree huggers and hippies.
Tens of thousands of Canadians are now proving conscious consumers do exist, and by putting a little more thought into things like where they buy their early morning java they’re making a huge difference.
It’s easy to see a shift in consumer choices, but what is important is a similar response from businesses.Fair traded products are like any other commodity in a free market economy, they are guided by simple supply and demand.
Change doesn’t have to come from waging wars against corporate giants or boycotting hundreds of companies. It’s about smart decisions on a local level.
The fair trade campaign began in the 1980s as concern for Third World farmers grew among North American and European activists. The problems they were protesting 30 years ago continue today.
Prices for crops like coffee, tea and cocoa haven’t risen for decades. Market prices are often lower than production costs, so farmers in the developing world end up relying on loans to finance their next season’s harvest. Most of the time these farmers are sucked into a spiral of debt that is nearly impossible to get out of.
Fairly traded products are bought from Third World producers at a price that covers living costs and sustainable production. They also guarantee that the consumer is not contributing to this cycle of foreign poverty.
In the beginning, fair trade products caught on slowly. Although they are far from the top of mainstream consumer consciousness, some big steps have been made.
Huge corporations like Timothy’s, Starbucks and Nestle now provide fair trade coffee as an option for customers. Even McDonald’s has jumped on the bandwagon. Last November they announced over 600 of their American restaurants would serve fair trade coffee.
TransFair Canada, the national fair trade certifying body, reports that fair trade product sales increased by 60 per cent in 2004 to more than $30 million. The number of companies selling fair-trade goods and the variety of goods certified also increased.
It’s not hard for local consumers to make ethical purchases. There are now more than 30 local businesses that sell fair trade products in Ottawa. Fair trade sports balls are being sold locally through Y Focus, a service group run out of the YMCA, and Ottawa’s five Bridgehead coffee houses are one of the country’s oldest chains to exclusively sell fair trade products.
The difference in price for consumers is minimal. Certified fair trade products usually sell for 10 per cent more than similar non-certified products. For a cup of coffee the difference is a few cents.
Although it may not seem like loose change can’t make a difference, it definitely does.
There are thousands of local farming co-operatives in Asia, Africa and South America that have benefited from fair trade.
TransFair Canada brought Mathurata Wijesinghe, the vice-president of a Sri Lankan farming co-operative to Canada last year. Wijesinghe said fair trade dollars are providing scholarships for students, farming equipment, and local water installations in his hometown.
TransFair Canada reports that the Nicaraguan growing co-operative PRODECOOP now has a social fund for disaster relief, health care and infrastructure development because of fair trade. The social impacts of fair trade in the developing world are undeniable and the financial strain on consumers is minimal.
Fair trade shouldn’t be a movement but a standard, and with growing a consumer conscious this is impossible.