SUSSED supports and promotes Fairtrade
Fairtrade products from around the world
Safi chooses something yummy at the SUSSED Bake Off
Fairtrade is about better prices, decent working conditions, local sustainability, and fair terms of trade for farmers and workers in the developing world.
A fair and secure price to the producer
No child labour
Safe working conditions
Protection for the environment
Rights for women
A social premium
The number of ethical labels is growing, but Fairtrade remains unique. While other schemes aim to ‘protect the environment’ or ‘enable companies to trace their coffee’, Fairtrade’s focus is to support farmers and workers to improve the quality of their lives and take more control over their futures.
Fairtrade is the only certification scheme whose purpose is to tackle poverty (through the Fairtrade price and premium) and empower farmers and workers in developing countries to take a more active role in global supply chains. Fairtrade delivers unique benefits to producers, businesses and consumers. At an international level, it is part owned by farmers and workers, who sit on the Board and participate in decision making.
10 principles of Fair Trade
Over 450 organisations are guaranteed members of the World Fair Trade Organization, and can use the guaranteed member label on their products. The World Fair Trade Organisation carries out verification and monitoring to ensure these principles are upheld. Members must show that they meet the 10 Principles of Fair Trade, which specify the ways that Fair Trade Enterprises are set up and behave to ensure they put people and planet first.
making the small switch to Fairtrade supports producers in protecting the future of some of our most-loved food and the planet.
Coffee, bananas and chocolate could soon be much more difficult to buy. Climate change is making crops like these harder and harder to grow. Combined with deeply unfair trade, communities growing these crops are being pushed to the brink.
But here’s the good news. More people choosing Fairtrade means extra income, power and support for those communities.
By making the small switch to Fairtrade, we can all support producers in protecting the future of some of our most-loved food and the planet.
By 2050, in fact, up to half of the world’s land currently used to farm coffee may be unusable.
Between 2012 and 2017, Coffee Rust (aka La Roya) caused more than $3 billion in damage and lost profits and forced almost 2 million farmers off their land. Changing weather has created conditions that has made coffee farms more vulnerable to the disease.
93% of the Fairtrade coffee farmers in Kenya surveyed are already experiencing the effects of climate change.
In India, research has shown that Fairtrade tea growers are reporting more flooding, along with extreme temperatures and water scarcity, as a result of climate change.
Recent drought events in 2015 and 2017 in East Africa, a key coffee growing region, have been attributed to human-caused climate change. Similarly, the extreme rainfall and floods in Peru in 2017, which led to mass agricultural losses, including crops such as bananas, were made more likely by human-caused climate change
Research has shown areas where many Fairtrade products are produced, including Central America, East Africa and the Caribbean, are very likely to experience increasingly extreme weather which will negatively affect their ability to grow crops
In a recent survey with Kenyan coffee farmers, 72% of farmers surveyed agreed that the Fairtrade price they receive for their coffee harvests helps them to invest in their farms to prepare for climate change
Cost of Living
• Grain, oil and fertiliser shortages during the pandemic and the war in Ukraine have exposed people in low-income countries to food poverty and hardship and without resilience, it’s very tough to deal with.
• Research proves that farmers that are members of Fairtrade certified organisations report greater economic resilience than non-Fairtrade farmers. Fairtrade’s safety nets – including the Minimum Price and Premium, low- or no-interest loans, co-operative support for its members, and support in income diversification and other trainings – are essential during such catastrophes.
Find out more about Fairtrade and visit the Fairtrade Foundation UK website. Visit Fairtrade Wales
Fairtrade information logos for food