Fairtrade Fortnight, which this year runs from 22nd Feb to 7th March, is an opportunity to reflect on how many Big Swaps we’ve made in our lives.
Swapping tea, coffee, bananas, sugar etc for Fairtrade brands – and encouraging our families, friends and neighbours to do the same – makes a real difference to farmers, workers and communities in the developing world.
Did you know that less than 2% of tea sold in Ireland is Fairtrade? Even though tea is one of Ireland’s most popular commodities, it has one of the lowest percentages of Fairtrade usage. So why not take action?
Check out www.oxfamireland.org and ask Irish tea companies to switch to Fairtrade and play fair with tea workers. By swapping your usual brand of tea to Fairtrade and calling on Irish tea companies to do the same, you will be making a real difference.
Every single swap made to a Fairtrade product proves that we want producers in the developing world to get a better deal.
Fairtrade Fortnight 2010 kicked off in Dublin’s City Hall with the good news that the value of retail purchases of Fairtrade in Ireland in 2009 were estimated at €118m – an increase of 27% from the previous year. “We expect Fairtrade sales to grow again in 2010,” says Peter Gaynor, executive director of Fairtrade Mark Ireland. “In the last few months, and again this week, some of the best known brands in Ireland have announced they are switching over to Fairtrade.”
In recent months significant conversions to Fairtrade have been announced by Cadbury Ireland and Nestle. And this week, Ben & Jerry Ice Cream announced that it would complete the global conversion of it entire product range to Fairtrade ingredients by 2013.
“The big manufacturers are realising that Fairtrade is also good for business,” says Gaynor. “It’s also important to acknowledge that Fairtrade’s growth in this country is a testimony to the work of our volunteers – they believed in Fairtrade when it was perceived as a worthy but unrealistic niche business.”
Volunteers have driven the Fairtrade Towns and Schools initiatives and 45 towns and cities north and south, including Dublin, Belfast, Cork and Galway, are now certified Fairtrade Towns. Three more – Tuam, Tipperary and Carrick-on-Suir – will be Fairtrade-certified in the next fortnight. An additional 29 towns are working towards Fairtrade Town status.
Don’t forget to check out Ireland’s first Fairtrade online shop – http://www.oxfamirelandshop.com/catalog/specials.php?page=1.