
Photographer : Trent Roche |
What is fair trade?
The fair trade movement began in the late 1950s as an attempt to aid Chinese refugees in the US. Today, the International Fair Trade Association includes over one million producers and 3,000 organisations in 50 countries.
Fair trade is a response to increasing globalisation. According to Oxfam and other fair trade advocates, large, developed nations like the US, UK and even Australia, pay their farmers to overproduce crops like coffee, corn and wheat. This overproduction drives crop prices down. The excess is then sold to underdeveloped or developing nations at absurdly low prices. This drives local farmers out of business, because they can’t compete.
The fair trade movement aims to give these small local farmers a chance. Fair trade organisations work with local producers to sell goods on a global scale. Fair traders produce everything from earrings to chocolate to flour and wheat. So if you’re in the market for an organic, ecologically and economically friendly cup of joe, an organisation can act a agent between you and a coffee farmer in Honduras. Through fair trade, you can buy coffee from that farmer, and she’ll get most of the profits, instead of large corporations.
The fair trade movement also supports equal pay for women, eco-friendly modes of production and, safe and healthy work environments.
In this way, the main goal of fair trading is to end world poverty by establishing millions of successful, independent, local producers in developing countries such as Ghana, India, Sri Lanka, Mexico and dozens more.
One big barrier
Fair trade advocates often argue that their biggest obstacle is the
World Trade Organisation (WTO). The WTO is an organisation of 149 member nations that meet regularly to discuss global trade agreements. Many of the member nations put high taxes on imported goods and subsidies for domestic farmers in order to promote their own economies, with the cooperation of the WTO.
Fair traders argue that, while these trade decisions may be beneficial for one or two nations, they are detrimental to the global economy and are the reason why many developing nations are still impoverished. Fair traders believe the WTO has a responsibility to promote fair trade rather than a trade system that benefits only a few wealthy nations.
How do I know this?
IFAT: The International Fair Trade Association,
http://www.ifat.org/
Make Trade Fair,
http://www.maketradefair.com
Oxfam Australia,
http://www.oxfam.org.au
Peace Coffee,
Barriers to Fair Trade: The WTO,
https://www.peacecoffee.com/pcfg/0308/wto.html