Today’s 10 Minute Eco-Action Tip: Buy (organic) Fairtrade coffee!

From the Fairtrade Foundation website:
What is Fairtrade? “Fairtrade is about better prices, decent working conditions, local sustainability, and fair terms of trade for farmers and workers in the developing world. By requiring companies to pay sustainable prices (which must never fall lower than the market price), Fairtrade addresses the injustices of conventional trade, which traditionally discriminates against the poorest, weakest producers. It enables them to improve their position and have more control over their lives.”

What are Fairtrade Standards? Fairtrade standards comprise both minimum social, economic and environmental requirements, which producers must meet to be certified, plus progress requirements that encourage continuous improvement to develop farmers’ organisations or the situation of estate workers.

What is the Fairtrade minimum price? The Fairtrade minimum price defines the lowest possible price that a buyer of Fairtrade products must pay the producer.

What is the Fairtrade Foundation? Celebrating the 15th year of the Fairtrade mark! The Fairtrade Foundation is a development organizations committed to tackling poverty and injustice through trade, and the UK member of Fairtrade Labelling Organizations International (FLO).

–Posted by Annie B. Bond, author of Better Basics for the Home and four other books including upcoming True Food (National Geographic, 2010).