Fairtrade is not just about helping struggling farmers. Businesses need sustainable supply chains, says Harriet Lamb
As our TVs fill with images of slimline blurs shooting down snowy mountains, I am reminded of another Winter Olympics when my children were staying with Granny. When I joined them I was amazed to find the whole Somerset village in a buzz about... the women's curling. I was perplexed. Until I joined the next excited gathering around the screen. For these were not super-athletes. Here were ordinary women with bumpy bodies like the rest of us, going for gold. And winning.
Fairtrade has just that appeal. Fairtrade offers businesses an alternative model about how together we can tackle poverty among farmers in our supply chains overseas. As a member of the public, you can create change simply by buying Fairtrade. There are now 468 Fairtrade towns, more than 6,000 faith groups, 114 universities and 4,000 schools where people are committed to raising awareness and sales of Fairtrade.
It is in part thanks to these supporters that Fairtrade has weathered the economic storm to date and sales are still climbing. December's IGD research found that 27% of shoppers had specifically purchased Fairtrade products over the previous month, 25% were prepared to pay a little more for Fairtrade products and 31% one in three expected to be buying more Fairtrade by 2012.
It is estimated that the global downturn pushed 50 to 90 million more people into living on less than £1 a day. On a tea estate in Southern India, farmers I met spoke of how they were unable to get by on their wages but also of the near impossibility of getting credit.
Now more than ever, farmers need companies to offer them pre-financing and help facilitate access to credit. Otherwise, the very people who have the fewest resources end up taking all the risk. Too often, they have to plant, harvest and process without security of orders or pre-financing. Too often, they have no choice but to go to unscrupulous moneylenders.
But while it is more profitable in the short term to pass risks and cost-cutting down the supply chain, in the end that is a risky strategy for businesses here. As more are realising, developing sustainable supply chains is in their interests.
Cadbury was shocked to find that the average age of a Ghanaian cocoa farmer is 51. Young men were drifting into the cities, seeing no future in cocoa. As Cadbury said: no beans, no bars. And that means investments in trees, in extension services, in improving productivity, in prices paid.
Along the border in the Ivory Coast, in a Fairtrade cocoa co-op from which Nestlé now buys, a shocking 95% of members are illiterate. Which is why the co-op's first premium investments are in schools but also in adult education.
Every reputable grocery company invests in its staff, and in preventing risks. Now it is becoming increasingly clear that companies need just as much to invest in building sustainable supply chains and long-term relations with the farmers.
Which is why this Fairtrade Fortnight, the Foundation is calling on more companies and consumers to swap to Fairtrade.
Ben & Jerry's has just announced it is switching all its flavours to Fairtrade. It is just the kind of bold initiative we hope more companies will be ready to make this year.
Harriet Lamb is executive director of the Fairtrade Foundation.
As our TVs fill with images of slimline blurs shooting down snowy mountains, I am reminded of another Winter Olympics when my children were staying with Granny. When I joined them I was amazed to find the whole Somerset village in a buzz about... the women's curling. I was perplexed. Until I joined the next excited gathering around the screen. For these were not super-athletes. Here were ordinary women with bumpy bodies like the rest of us, going for gold. And winning.
Fairtrade has just that appeal. Fairtrade offers businesses an alternative model about how together we can tackle poverty among farmers in our supply chains overseas. As a member of the public, you can create change simply by buying Fairtrade. There are now 468 Fairtrade towns, more than 6,000 faith groups, 114 universities and 4,000 schools where people are committed to raising awareness and sales of Fairtrade.
It is in part thanks to these supporters that Fairtrade has weathered the economic storm to date and sales are still climbing. December's IGD research found that 27% of shoppers had specifically purchased Fairtrade products over the previous month, 25% were prepared to pay a little more for Fairtrade products and 31% one in three expected to be buying more Fairtrade by 2012.
It is estimated that the global downturn pushed 50 to 90 million more people into living on less than £1 a day. On a tea estate in Southern India, farmers I met spoke of how they were unable to get by on their wages but also of the near impossibility of getting credit.
Now more than ever, farmers need companies to offer them pre-financing and help facilitate access to credit. Otherwise, the very people who have the fewest resources end up taking all the risk. Too often, they have to plant, harvest and process without security of orders or pre-financing. Too often, they have no choice but to go to unscrupulous moneylenders.
But while it is more profitable in the short term to pass risks and cost-cutting down the supply chain, in the end that is a risky strategy for businesses here. As more are realising, developing sustainable supply chains is in their interests.
Cadbury was shocked to find that the average age of a Ghanaian cocoa farmer is 51. Young men were drifting into the cities, seeing no future in cocoa. As Cadbury said: no beans, no bars. And that means investments in trees, in extension services, in improving productivity, in prices paid.
Along the border in the Ivory Coast, in a Fairtrade cocoa co-op from which Nestlé now buys, a shocking 95% of members are illiterate. Which is why the co-op's first premium investments are in schools but also in adult education.
Every reputable grocery company invests in its staff, and in preventing risks. Now it is becoming increasingly clear that companies need just as much to invest in building sustainable supply chains and long-term relations with the farmers.
Which is why this Fairtrade Fortnight, the Foundation is calling on more companies and consumers to swap to Fairtrade.
Ben & Jerry's has just announced it is switching all its flavours to Fairtrade. It is just the kind of bold initiative we hope more companies will be ready to make this year.
Harriet Lamb is executive director of the Fairtrade Foundation.
No comments yet