Fairtrade Flashcards
What is Fairtrade?
Fairtrade is an NGO that ensures that farmers receive a fair price for what they produce.
What has happened to farmers wages over the last 40 years?
The price paid to many farmers has halved over the last 40 years due to the large supermarket buying power and the fact that supermarkets goods such as bananas as ‘loss leaders’ to lure shoppers into the shop.
How has Fairtrade grown recently?
In 2018 1/3 of bananas sold in the UK were Fairtrade with many of these coming from small scale farms.
Despite being more expensive and increasing cost of living the demand for these products has only kept increasing.
What do Fairtrade do for these farmers?
Pay farmers a guaranteed minimum price
Offer fair terms of trade
Pay for additional development for reinvestment into the local community
Number of Fairtrade producers
Number of Countries
Number who benefit
1210 Fairtrade-Certified producer organisations
Across 74 countries
Benefitting around 6 million people
How have banana TNCs harmed small-scale farmers?
Banana TNCs can buy flatten large areas to create banana plantations that are farmed by workers who are paid very little and work in poor working conditions.
Large economies of scale and access to markets allows TNCs to produce at such a massive scale and sell at a lower price that smaller-scale farmers cant afford to produce at.
Also these large TNCs often buy up large amounts of natural land that would have used to have been used by small scale farmers before they got bought out.
Fairtrade production over time:
First sold in the US in the late 40s focusing on handicrafts boosting families income and women’s involvement in the economy.
Fairtrade sugar was sold from the beginning with coffee first sold in 1973.
These were first sold in ‘World shops’ like Oxfam and raised awareness of trade issues at the point of sale.
From the late 80s onwards Fairtrade products have significantly boosted consumer awareness and the influence of TNCs has significantly decreased.
