Fairtrade Easter egg rip off

The point is whether the farmers are better off under a fairtrade scheme than the alternative. And the answer is of course that yes, they are.

Of course, if the OP feels that they would be better off buying an ASDA egg for £1.50 and giving the £2.50 difference to a development charity, then I wouldn't particularly argue. Though I would be prepared to suggest that the amount going to support an individual farmer wouldn't be much different in this case either, because all of the major development charities quite rightly spend a significant proportion of their efforts and funds on trying the change the overall economic system, through campaigning and lobbying as well as strengthening third sector organisations in developing countries.

You're right, there's still a supply chain and still manicuring costs and neither of those get cheaper just because the raw material was dearer. In fact, the lower volume may mean the other costs are proportionately higher, which helps explain the premium. Traidcraft products are also a higher quality line than the mass-market ones, and if they use 100% FT cocoa instead of a proportion (as some greenwashers do), their direct costs are higher. Position then with Lindt, not the cheapie stuff with vegetable fats, etc.

'Give the money through a church instead' has some merit, it depends what's important to you. Some churches support missions with donations, which is more of a theological lobbying than aid distribution. Maybe this is fine by you, and it certainly isn't all churches, but I question the value of sending a rich westerner to buy bubbles and patronise poor locals for those that do.

Where the church gifted money goes in aid, as much will, is that also the best solution, to hand out food and extend dependency? It's like giving a beggar £1, it reinforces the victim behaviour, whereas whilst The Big Issue might be a pretty awful read, the point is that it's a framework to help people up, step at a time. Fair Trade is similar, especially Traidcraft and ilk - they remove dependency SSSI people can get on with earning a living. The guarantee over the market rate isn't a handout for 'being good', it's to offer a commercial alternative so farmers don't have to rely on a monopoly mechanism which left unchallenged would happily pay them £0/kg for beans. That commercial alternative, along with small loans, social infrastructure, etc is not about a handout, it's just levelling the playing field a bit.

It's a little like organic food, there are negligible if any qualified health benefits (maybe some trace minerals) and flavour benefits are not guaranteed, but that's not what it's about. Organic food is about the whole system, about not racing to the bottom, supporting some other important things. For instance, by feeding the soil, which feeds the plants, the whole ecosystem gets to thrive, biodiversity is maintained, bees, birds, the lot all get to live on a bit of land. Welfare standards are very high for livestock not because they eat organic grass so much as the two go hand in hand, if you care about things, you look after them, don't pump them with American style artificial growth hormones to make more but unnatural meat.

So I think there are a lot of parallels, the premium you pay certainly doesn't all go to the farmer, but some does, and the bit that does is supportive in a wider sense.

midnitegremlin wrote: »

Better off, quite possibly, but is it fair?

For sure, not everyone will share this viewpoint but the point I'm aiming for here is this. The whole system is not "fair" it is very very biased in favour of big business, western capitalism etc.

A lot of businesses selling "fair trade" products will be making a lot more money than the farmers. And thay, fundamentally, is unfair. (Depending on your political viewpoint.)

Of course the whole system is unfair. Fair trade doesn't claim to solve this, just to make things less unfair. The organisations working on fair trade also work on the structural issues; but trade still needs to happen whilst those are sorted out (if they ever are). And fair trade at least makes things better - significantly better -for those farmers participating.

You could make a case that because world trade is so unfair, you won't buy any products that rely on it. But you will rapidly run out of things to eat, wear or type on! So in the meantime, fair trade (and especially fair trade through the more ethical organisations like Traidcraft) is the best available option.