World Fair Trade Day is this Saturday, a day to celebrate all the hard work of global fair trade sellers for their support of workers in poorer countries.
York has been officially recognised as a fair trade city since 2004, but what does fair trade really mean and how are shops in York supporting the title?
There are two shops dedicated to fairtrade in York; Fairer World, an independent business located on Gillygate, and Shared Earth, a fair trade, eco and ethical small chain with it’s York branch located on Minstergate.
Fairer world, which is run by husband and wife Charlie and Moira, has been on Gillygate for 30 years and previously owned two other versions of the shop.
Charlie explains a simplified version of fair trade as:
“A way of vulnerable people in poor countries finding a way to get more control of their own lives and to put food on the table”
He says that the vertical structure of society means that:
“The most vulnerable, people with the least voice and the least capacity to have any bargaining power”
“By fair trade they can make their own decisions because they’ve got the capacity through greater economic independence.”
Fair trade is most commonly recognised through the fairtrade international logo, the blue, green and black logo commonly found on bananas and chocolate.
Charlie shared that craft pieces and other non food items aren’t verified by that same certification but that to guarantee something is fair trade, you can check the British Organisation for Fair Trade Shops (BAFTS) website, which has a list of fair trade products and their origins.
For Charlie and Moira, fair trade has been a part of their lives for a long time.
Charlie remarked that Moira actually helped found BAFTS in the 90s.
Fair Trade has changed a lot since then, Charlie noted that they have started selling Palestinian fair trade products:
“people in the UK want to make their own commitment to Palestine, to make it in a fair trade way is what our customers wish to do.
In that way, fair trade is still expanding.”
Jeremy Piercy, founder and Managing Director of Shared Earth York, traveled Asia and after witnessing the poverty first hand, decided to take action thus creating his fair trade company.
Jeremy told me that when it comes to fair trade:
“Climate change is to my mind as important as paying people good wages or treating workers well and so on.”
“It’s affecting millions of people in developing countries with floods and failing harvests and this kind of thing.”
This means for Jeremy’s shop, they sell both fair trade items as well as sustainably made products.
Listen to more of what Charlie from Fairer world had to say below:
