Fair Trade is a movement designed to eliminate poverty and practices erosive to social and environmental responsibility. The movement focuses on the facilitation of Fair Trade between producers in economically challenged regions often in the Southern hemisphere and more affluent marketers and consumers primarily in the Northern hemisphere. Through collaboration and implementation we have found the standards can be applied to any organization resulting in a triple bottom line for people, profit, and planet. As a sixty- plus year old movement, Fair Trade has many participants, governing bodies, and voices expanding, and sometimes contracting, the Fair Trade experience.
The International Fair Trade Association defines Fair Trade with ten standards. These standards serve as a guide of operational practices for producers and marketers alike.
Paraphrased Fair Trade Standards:
- Opportunities: Create opportunities for producers disadvantaged or marginalized by the conventional trading system.
- Transparency and Accountability: Transparent management and commercial relations.
- Capacity Building: Develop producers’ independence.
- Promoting Fair Trade: Provide consumers with Fair Trade education and honest marketing.
- Payment of a Fair Price: A fair price in the local context agreed through dialogue and participation.
- Gender Equity: Women’s work is properly valued and rewarded.
- Working Conditions: Safe and healthy working environment for producers.
- Child Labor: Children’s well-being, security, educational requirements and need for play are key.
- The Environment: Encourage better environmental practices and responsible methods of production.
- Trade Relations: Advance payments are made when possible, and profits are not maximized at producers’ expense.
– the International Fair Trade Association
I began to work with this model specifically in 2002. As a volunteer I founded The Fair Trade Market, a yearly Fair Trade bazaar in Manchester, Missouir, in 2003 with the Justice Advocates. As the market continued to grow over the years into the largest of its kind in the U.S., I began to experiment. I applied the ten standards in my practice, P3 Strategies, other business and volunteer ventures, and with my clients.
From the experiments I developed a guiding set of socially and environmentally responsible principles we adopted as our core values in 2005.
Our work, speaking, and writing contains definitions, news, examples, resources and how-tos of the concepts of Fair Trade and other socially and environmentally responsible models for life at home and at work. All of my learning has been collaborative through conversation, experiments, or the study of existing work. Collaborative additions to our ever growing collection of socially and environmentally responsible models is always welcome.
Gain the treasures of a triple bottom line found in the standards of Fair Trade, Green, and Corporate Social Responsibility for success in people, profit, and planet. Let us prepare a tailored P3 Strategies treasure map for you, be your tool and experience rich guide on your journey to more, or bring the treasure right to your door.
