Fairtrade Exhibition

Fairtrade Exhibition at the Eastgate centre in Basildon. This will be open throughout the Fairtrade Fortnight giving the public an opportunity to sample some Fairtrade foods, ask questions about Fairtrade and enter a free prize draw.

Eastgate Shopping Centre
Basildon
England, 22 February 2010, from 12:00 AM
Contact Email: louise.edwards"basildon.gov.uk

Fairtrade Tea Bag Giveaway

All libraries in the London Borough of Lewisham will be giving away a Fairtrade teabag to anyone borrowing books, CDs or DVDs during Fairtrade Fortnight while stocks last.

Lewisham Library, 199-201 Lewisham High Street, London, SE13 6LG Blackheath Village Library, 3-4 Blackheath Grove, London SE3 0DD Catford Library, Laurence House, 1 Catford Road, London SE6 4RU Crofton Park Library, 375 Brockley Road, Brockley, London SE4
London, 22 February 2010, from 12:00 AM
Contact Email: rachael.wallach@lewisham.gov.uk
Venue

Swap our cuppa

Leeds Hospital Chapliancy will be challenging hospital staff to change their coffee break policy and swap existing products with Fairtrade products. Catering departments challenged to promote Fair Trade prodcuts.

Leeds Teaching Hospitals NHS Trust
West Yorkshire, 22 February 2010, from 12:00 AM
Contact Email: kelvin.burke@leedsth.nhs.uk
Venue

More events 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 > >>

Fairtrade Exhibition

Eastgate Shopping Centre
Basildon
England, 22 February 2010

If you're hosting a Big Swap event then brilliant, tell us all about it here. It's a quick and easy way to share it with as many people as possible. The more people swapping the merrier.

Ecocoffee will be featured at the UK’s biggest green lifestyle event at the Barbican in London this weekend. Our Triple Certified Honduras coffee will be served in the Room For Change, designed by www.neocreative.co.uk

A Brighton-based communications agency has created a novel way to inspire greener lifestyles. The Room For Change is a virtual living room decorated with eco-friendly products and installations, designed by neo to give consumers everyday ideas for greener living. The creative team at neo say that they have created a unique combination of comedy, cross-stitch and common sense. Installations include a goat made from hubcaps (to encourage people to consider buying ethical or recycled products) and a toilet full of mobile phones to communicate how recycling your mobile can fund capital projects in the third world (as well as highlighting the dangers of texting on the toilet). The Room For Change will be unveiled at LONDON AWARE 08, the UK’s biggest green lifestyle event, at The Barbican (Sat May 10 – Sun May 11)

Neo was formed in 2002 to work with organizations that bring about positive change. Clients include Greenpeace, Arts Council England and Homeless Link.

For further details please contact Rachel Holland at neo on 01273 600500 or email <mailto:rachel@neocreative.co.uk> rachel@neocreative.co.uk or visit <http://www.neocreative.co.uk/> www.neocreative.co.uk

For details of the show visit www.ukaware.com

11th September 2007

Fairtrade celebrations with Ecocoffee for Ethiopian New Year

Coffee farmers across Ethiopia, the birthplace of coffee, have fresh hope for the future. The international film release, “Black Gold” has urgently reminded audiences that a cup of coffee is a connection to millions of people struggling to survive. Fairtrade coffee producers are relying on the consumer world to buy and use their certified products to cover the cost of production and receive a living wage as an alternative to perpetual crisis and poverty.

Ecocoffee supplies ground and whole bean coffee from the 103,000 farmers in 115 cooperatives in the Oromia Coffee Farms Cooperative Union in Ethiopia (OCFCU) featured in “Black Gold”, the movie. The Oromia region in Ethiopia produces 65% of the country’s coffee. Approximately 618,000 households in the region are involved in coffee production. Men and women of the OCFCU are the growers, processors and exporters of high quality, organic Arabica coffee.

Paul Greenhalgh of Ecocoffee said, “The best way for coffee-lovers to celebrate all year long is with Ecocoffee’s monthly delivery of OCFCU’s Mocha Sidamo at home and as a gift to UK friends and relatives. At the end of 12 months, Ecocoffee will make an extra donation to the OCFCU to further their community projects and positively impact people’s lives.”

Pete Thompson, Sahara Marathon veteran and 2008 competitor, urges all Fairtrade supporters to take up the challenge: “I ran 150 miles across the Sahara in 2005 to raise money and awareness for North African lion conservation. I have worked with Barbary lions for 10 years in the UK as a keeper. Big cat conservation supporters know that human poverty has to be in check for wildlife issues to move forward.

Pete continued, “I urge every admirer of cats – be they lion or tabby – to order OCFCU Mocha Sidamo from Ecocoffee starting this Ethiopian New Year. Barbary lions and Ethiopan lions once shared a range across North Africa before the global economy. This is the time to use Fairtrade to get the balance right for people and animals in Africa and elsewhere.”

For information the Barbary Lion Project contact Pete Thompson, Friends of Wildlink, fow.office@yahoo.co.uk

Also, www.peterthompson.saharamarathon.co.uk

SEPTEMBER 2007

Online Sales in the Retail Sector

In 2002 internet/online sales accounted for only approximately 2% of the total spend in the retail sector. This has grown considerably and is set to reach 15% by the end of this year, 2007. Forecasts suggest that 40% of all retail sales will be accounted for by online outlets by 2020.

According to comparison site uSwitch, "online sales in the UK are set to reach a staggering £40 billion this year and could grow to £162 billion by 2020"

A shift in buying patterns

Uswitch said, "It took a while coming, but Britain is at last riding high on the wave of the broadband revolution, with hundreds of consumers signing up to faster speeds and lower prices every day".

Clearly those companies with e-commerce websites are set to take advantage of this shift in buying habits and those without will inevitably struggle.

Courtesy of ekm

DID YOU KNOW .... ???

Coffee is the most popular drink worldwide with over 400 billion cups consumed each year.

Last year in Britain, £730 million was spent on coffee.

31 billion cups of coffee are drunk in the UK every year.

On average, men drink more coffee than women (1.7 cups per day vs 1.5 cups).

37% of coffee drinkers drink their coffee black, while 63% add sugar.

GOSH !!!

Small Scale Coffee Farmers To Benefit From International Increase In Fairtrade Coffee Price

14 December 2007

From 1 June 2008, the Fairtrade minimum price for Arabica coffee will increase to ensure that farmers continue to receive a price which covers the cost of sustainable production.

Producers will receive a guaranteed minimum price of at least US $1.25 per pound of Fairtrade certified Arabica coffee and US $1.20 for unwashed Arabica coffee, or the market price, if that is higher. In accordance with the Fairtrade model, producer organisations will also continue to receive an additional Fairtrade Premium of 10 cents per pound for investment in community and business improvements. For organic Fairtrade certified coffee an additional minimum differential of 20 cents is applied.

The announcement from Fairtrade Labelling Organizations International (FLO) means that farmers will receive an average increase of US$ 5 cents per pound on their coffee. This price adjustment will benefit more than 250 producer organisations across the developing world - around one million farmers and their families.

“I represent more than one million family farmers who need Fairtrade pricing to put food on the table and keep their kids in school,” said Raul de Aguila, a Peruvian coffee grower and Cafédirect board member. “No other label or certification system ensures a fair income for a hard day’s work. This increase will have a direct and positive impact
on the lives of Fairtrade Certified coffee farmers around the world.”

The price increase is the result of extensive field research into the real costs of sustainable production to ensure that Fairtrade continues to address the needs of coffee-producing communities. The research was followed by a multi-stakeholder review process involving producers, consumers and industry representatives from more than twenty countries around the world. The new minimum price will be valid until June 2010, when another price review will take place.

Penny Newman, CEO of Cafédirect, says, "It's our mission to create secure, sustainable livelihoods for growers, and this decision is a step in the right direction. Working closely with our grower partners, Cafédirect champions the need to continually assess the Fairtrade pricing structure to ensure it's relevant to their needs."

The price increase has also received support from other UK coffee industry players. David Williamson, Managing Director of independent coffee roaster Matthew Algie said: ”We are 100% behind Fairtrade as the best way to work in partnership with smallholder co-operatives and rovide them with stability. Today over 70% of our green coffee is Fairtrade certified and we welcome this increase in the Fairtrade minimum price.”

Fairtrade is the only certification model that guarantees prices to farmers that meet strict social and environmental sustainability criteria, and the FAIRTRADE Mark has become one of the most recognized consumer labels in the UK . Research by DEFRA this year showed that more than eighty percent of the UK public say they have heard of Fairtrade, and more than half of those people said they made an effort to buy it.

According to Ian Bretman, Deputy Director of the Fairtrade Foundation in the UK and FLO Board member, “The conscious consumer demands high-quality products that make a difference in the world. The research is clear: consumers are willing to pay more for Fairtrade products because they help lift farmers out of poverty. This moderate price increase in Fairtrade coffee will not undercut the dramatic growth of consumer demand for Fairtrade products; on the contrary, it gives concerned consumers additional evidence that Fairtrade truly delivers on its promise of farmer empowerment.”

The Fairtrade minimum price for coffee is important because the international coffee market is highly volatile. Frequently international coffee prices have plummeted to under US$ 0.60 per pound, well below the cost of production, forcing literally millions of family farmers into poverty. In this difficult and unstable market, the Fairtrade price makes a tangible difference in the lives of farmers by ensuring greater price stability and a sustainable income.

For more information, interviews or photographs please contact Martine Julseth at the Fairtrade Foundation at martine.julseth@fairtrade.org.uk; or call 020 7440 7695/07770 957 451

Fairtrade sales reach half a billion pounds

UK estimated retail sales of Fairtrade products reach half a billion pounds as Fairtrade Foundation calls on business and the public to step up pace of change

Sales of Fairtrade products in 2007, announced to coincide with the beginning of Fairtrade Fortnight (25 February – 9 March 2008) set a new pace for international trade. As events to kickstart the two-week annual campaign entitled Change Today. Choose Fairtrade take place across the UK today, the Fairtrade Foundation reveals an increase of estimated retail sales of Fairtrade products to £493m.

More importantly still, in 2007 the real volumes (by weight or number) of produce more than doubled over 2006, which is great news for the producers whose Fairtrade premiums are based on these volumes.

In a landmark move to coincide with the launch of Fairtrade Fortnight, Tate & Lyle is announcing that they are switching their entire retail cane sugar range to Fairtrade within two years. In the first year alone, this increases tenfold the total volumes of Fairtrade sugar sold in the UK in 2007. It will also yield Fairtrade premiums of around £2 m to small-scale growers in the Belize Sugar Cane Farmers’ Association, who will be the first to benefit from the Fairtrade premiums generated. This Tate & Lyle switch is the biggest move by a UK food manufacturing company and the Fairtrade Foundation calls on other companies to follow this lead.

The Fairtrade Foundation’s message for Fairtrade Fortnight 2008 is that, whilst sales of Fairtrade products continue to soar, change is still not happening quickly enough for the millions of the world’s poorest farmers who remain trapped in ‘trade poverty’. With 2 billion working people earning less than US$2 a day and many of these producing the products we put in our shopping baskets, the Fairtrade Foundation believes that it is critical to increase the momentum for change through Fairtrade in 2008.

“The fantastic increase in sales of Fairtrade goods in 2007 shows the UK’s public’s huge and growing appetite for Fairtrade,” says Harriet Lamb, Executive Director of the Fairtrade Foundation. “After years of chipping away, Fairtrade supporters are finally beginning to make some significant impression on the way companies trade. Increasing numbers of people in the UK are buying Fairtrade goods as a practical action everyone can take to help tackle poverty in the developing world. And that’s good news for the seven million people, growers and their families, around the world who benefit from the Fairtrade system, as well as the thousands of people in this country who have been campaigning since the early 1990s to make trade fairer”.

“But the pace of change must quicken. The scale and level of poverty worldwide demands that we all urgently play our part to scale up Fairtrade. That means more companies offering more Fairtrade products and the public putting those Fairtrade goods in their shopping baskets. The Fairtrade Foundation itself is determined to open up more opportunities for more growers worldwide in particular in some of the poorest countries of the world, such as Malawi, from where I have recently returned.”

Since 2005, the number of African producer organisations selling to the UK market has almost doubled from 81 to 152, each organisation often representing thousands of farmers and workers. However, farmers’ networks are keen for the Fairtrade model to be significantly expanded in their countries, a challenge that the Foundation and its international partners are determined to rise to.

“For the past fifteen years, the Fairtrade system has championed sustainable agriculture and fairer prices for tea growers in East Africa, enabling us to survive a longstanding decline in tea auction prices.”, said Silver Kasoro-Atwoki, tea grower and shareholder in the Mabale Growers Tea Factory Ltd, Uganda. “Only by selling to the international Fairtrade market, have we had the stability to build up democratic farmers’ organisations, to invest in quality or training, and bring much needed investment to our communities.”

Other recent commercial developments in the UK include major switches from Sainsbury’s, which has moved all their bananas, Red Label tea and own-brand sugar to Fairtrade and committed to switch the remainder of their tea range plus all roast and ground coffee and hot chocolate; the Co-op which has switched all their hot beverages to Fairtrade; Waitrose which has switched all their bananas to Fairtrade; and several exciting developments in Fairtrade cotton products from Marks & Spencer, Tesco and Debenhams.

Change Today. Choose Fairtrade, the theme of Fairtrade Fortnight, is an urgent call to individuals, community groups, schools, universities and faith networks to scale up their own activity as part of the Fairtrade Foundation’s vision of an even bigger movement for positive change on trade. This is a challenge to consumers to see the regular purchasing of Fairtrade products as a long-term contribution to tackling poverty - so that people in developing countries can also bring about the changes they want and need in their lives and communities.

A Fairtrade Fairground launched national Fairtrade Fortnight yesterday on the South Bank in London. To celebrate products carrying the FAIRTRADE Mark, a Fairtrade tea cup ride, a towering Helter Skelter, a Fairtrade coconut shy, candyfloss made with Fairtrade sugar and a fortune teller using Fairtrade tea leaves were just some of the games and activities bringing all the fun of the fair to the South Bank, whilst visitors also had opportunities to meet growers and producers and find out first-hand what lies behind the label as well as sample some of the 3,000 Fairtrade items now certified.

The Choose Fairtrade Bus unveiled at the Fairtrade Fairground sets will set off mid-day today (25 February) to travel to Ipswich and then travel during the Fortnight to Leeds, Sunderland, Glasgow, Liverpool, Birmingham, Cardiff, Bristol, Middlesbrough, Durham, Carlisle, Garstang, Stoke-on-Trent, Lichfield and Newcastle-under-Lyme. The bus will be the focus of interactive displays and activities, live music, discussions, competitions, and the opportunity to sample Fairtrade products and meet Fairtrade producers.

Elsewhere, over 10,000 events across the UK are expected to be taking place during the Fortnight, all aimed at building awareness of how small changes in shopping habits can make big differences to producers around the world.

Call us on 01342 833723

Small Scale Coffee Farmers To Benefit From International Increase In Fairtrade Coffee Price