In 2012 the Fairtrade Foundation is asking people across the globe to take a step for Fairtrade to help bring a brighter future to farming communities in the developing world.
Over the next two weeks (27th February to 11th March) Fairtrade Fortnight, the annual campaign to raise the profile of Fairtrade products and producers, will see a series of events of events taking place all over the country in celebration.
Leicester was one of the first cities to gain Fairtrade status in 2002 as a result of work by LAFT (Leicester Advocating Fairtrade) – the Fairtrade action group for Leicester. The overall aim of the LAFT group is to increase awareness and use of Fairtrade products and resources across as wide a group of organisations and individuals as possible to ensure that not only does Leicester retain its Fairtrade City status but that it is also seen as an ethical leader. This year Leicester will be celebrating 10 Years of being a Fairtrade city.
Did You Know…?
– In 1992, The Co-operative was the first supermarket to embrace Fairtrade by stocking Café direct.
– In 2000, the Co-operative introduced the UK’s first Fairtrade bananas.
– The Co-operative Milk Chocolate was the UK’s first own-brand product to carry the Fairtrade mark.
– In 2003, The Co-operative converted all its own-brand coffee to Fairtrade.
– The Co-operative’s Fairtrade Chilean Carmenère was the UK’s first fairly-traded supermarket own-brand wine.
– In 2006 The Co-operative sourced five new own-label wines from the Du Toitskloof co-operative in South Africa, which is one of the largest Fairtrade projects in the world.
– In 2007, the first Fairtrade cotton bag for life went on sale in Co-op stores and Fairtrade bananas were made available in every store.
– In March 2008 The Co-operative switched all own-brand hot beverages to Fairtrade.
Here in Leicester, Just, The Fair Trade Shop, are planning to row and cycle 4200 miles (6750km) to St Lucia in support of Moses Renee, a banana farmer from St Lucia who will be visiting Leicester to give a talk explaining how the support of Fairtrade helped him and other farmers in St Lucia to recover from a devastating hurricane last year.
This event will take place on Saturday 3rd March in St Martin’s Square in the city centre from 11am until 4pm. Also on offer are free tastings of Fairtrade foods, competitions, footstep painting and peddle-powered banana smoothies.
For more information visit www.justfairtrade.com
Leave a Reply