Fairtrade Easter egg rip off

midnitegremlin

ElefantEd wrote: »

So in the meantime, fair trade (and especially fair trade through the more ethical organisations like Traidcraft) is the best available option.

Maybe, maybe not. It also of course doesn't address inequalities in the place of purchase. EG, does the shop selling Fairtrade pay all it's staff the living wage?

Fairtrade products tend to be quite pricey. And people like them- are the profits going to business who reinvest in the welfare of their own staff, higher wages for their own staff etc?

At the end of the day, it's personal opinion. If, all things considered, a person feels that spending their money at a shop run as most of the big shops are (low wages for staff etc) and buying Fairtrade chocolate and bananas is the best option, then fair play.

I'll conclude my comments here by saying sure, Fairtrade has merits, and is presumably aimed at consumers who feel they want to buy ethically. But for the "ethical consumer" does it stop there? Are they oblivious to, or do they ignore, so many other issues in their food production and retail?

paddyrg

midnitegremlin wrote: »

Maybe, maybe not. It also of course doesn't address inequalities in the place of purchase. EG, does the shop selling Fairtrade pay all it's staff the living wage?

Very fair point! I think there's probably a strong correlation, though. People who choose FT will also generally choose where they make their purchases and other shopping. There's probably a stronger correlation with Waitrose and independents than with ASDA or other deep discounter for instance.

People tend to act fairly consistently, and retailers who want to stock FT products will again tend towards other similar lines and practices. For instance co-op I think sell mostly fair trade bananas, and they like to think of themselves well positioned in the ethics patchwork.

We've also got safeguards in this country, NMW/NLW when it comes out enforces what you must pay people. Independent farmers in some nations just don't have that same luxury, which is where the FT premium for goods will help.

forgotmyname

Charities bug the hell out of me. In our mind (well mine) its some kindhearted person with a few spare hours volunteering or giving a little something to someone that has nothing.

Again to me it seems that its a way for certain people to get rich quick whilst giving very little to the intended cause.
I cannot remember the name of the charity but checking their accounts they spent more on office supplies etc then they actually handed out, the outgoings were massive.

Maybe because parked outside were several new cars none of which cost less than £40k. Cynical me thinks the people running it are taking much more than those that donate think.

unholyangel

This is an informative piece on the subject:
http://www.chocablog.com/features/how-fair-is-fairtrade-chocolate/

Even if what you buy has a fair trade logo, theres no guarantee that any ingredients in it are actually fair trade.

ElefantEd

But it also means that some bars without the fair trade logo have a corresponding amount of fair trade ingredients.

I'm not particularly defending Cadbury's, but they are meeting their FT obligations in the sense that the total amount of FT cocoa they buy is reflected in the number of FT chocolate bars they sell.

Having said that I would always go for a FT brand that does go the extra mile, in the spirit of FT, such as Divine - as the article goes on to say. The FT symbol defines a minimum standard, and there are companies which go beyond this.

unholyangel

ElefantEd wrote: »

But it also means that some bars without the fair trade logo have a corresponding amount of fair trade ingredients.

I'm not particularly defending Cadbury's, but they are meeting their FT obligations in the sense that the total amount of FT cocoa they buy is reflected in the number of FT chocolate bars they sell.

Having said that I would always go for a FT brand that does go the extra mile, in the spirit of FT, such as Divine - as the article goes on to say. The FT symbol defines a minimum standard, and there are companies which go beyond this.

Would it not be more transparent if companies were allowed to display the fair trade logo on all products they sell but it has to be accompanied by the % of cocoa etc ingredients that are actually fair trade.

Likewise there was a loophole in the system which allows non fair trade to be mixed with fair trade before its purchased and labelled as fair trade. I can't remember the specifics as it was a few years ago - but there are some massively shady practices from a supposedly ethical initiative.

Imo it should be an all or nothing thing. At present, a company can pretend to be ethical by buying 1% of ingredients as fair trade and 99% as non fair trade. Yet by purchasing 99% in non fair trade, they're supporting that lower market price. Which is in their interest. Because if the lower market price rises, then so does the fair trade price.

ElefantEd

No, items which are labelled as fair trade have to have all the relevant ingredients as fair trade. The mixing referred to in the link above means that the correct amount of fair trade cocoa is purchased, but it's not guaranteed that the specific amount goes into the specific bars (which I agree is not ideal, but the farmers aren't losing out, nor are the company able to pretend to be more FT than they are being).

So if Cadle has two bars, The SuperBar labelled as FT that comprises 10% of their sales and the non FT CarpoBar that comprises the other 90%, then so long as 10% of the cocoa they buy is FT, all is fine and dandy. They couldn't buy just 1% of FT and mix it in and still claim FT status for either bar.

PalacePurple

my mate got a job to sell spot the ball tickets for charity and said they only have to give 5 percent to the so called charity.
Shame
He didnt last the job though, guilt I think.
Or sick of people saying no.

Happytravelling

What a baffling post, starting with a complaint about not enough of the price paid going to the farmer then not being happy at paying the extra cost of fair trade chocolate it kitkat... which can't be a huge premium because it seems to me (although admittedly I haven't been tracking it) that kitkats have had similar price positioning with fair trade chocolate as without. I don't consider every purchase I make and am oblivious to a lot of what goes on behind the scenes in retail, but I have never bought a fair trade products and thought I wish they hadn't used fair trade ingredients so this would be cheaper to me.

There are a lot of fair trade coffee options if choosing ground coffee rather than instant. I've never tasted an instant coffee, fair trade or otherwise, that I could enjoy personally. Perhaps more people would buy from the stall at church if it was selling products that people like.

There are certain products I always try to buy fair trade, bananas, coffee and tea for example. I also like companies that operate as businesses to generate profits for charity, such as 'one', and lending money through microfinance organisations, to give people an opportunity to help themselves.

Thanks to grumpygardener for starting the thread though, through people's responses I've learned some new things about fair trade.

unholyangel

ElefantEd wrote: »

No, items which are labelled as fair trade have to have all the relevant ingredients as fair trade. The mixing referred to in the link above means that the correct amount of fair trade cocoa is purchased, but it's not guaranteed that the specific amount goes into the specific bars (which I agree is not ideal, but the farmers aren't losing out, nor are the company able to pretend to be more FT than they are being).

So if Cadle has two bars, The SuperBar labelled as FT that comprises 10% of their sales and the non FT CarpoBar that comprises the other 90%, then so long as 10% of the cocoa they buy is FT, all is fine and dandy. They couldn't buy just 1% of FT and mix it in and still claim FT status for either bar.

You've completely misunderstood my post I think.

The 1%/99% I was referring to was not per product but rather their entire purchase stock. It was referring to market manipulation rather than what goes into each individual bar.

Likewise when I said non fair trade gets mixed with fair trade, I wasn't referring to in each individual bar (although that does happen obviously). I meant that the origin/source of beans is sometimes muddied - and non fair trade beans can end up being sold as fair trade due to passing hands dozens of times before the buyers even see it.

Another drawback is that (apparently) most of the extra money is eaten up by the increased costs of adhering to the fair trade rules.

Would be interesting to know which companies use the highest amount of fair trade though. I know cadburys buy 16,000 tonnes of it - but can't seem to find how much non fair trade they purchase to compare.