Trading Visions, in collaboration with the LSE International Development Department, held a well attended public discussion debate on Tuesday 1st March 2011. The topic was 'Has Fairtrade asked for enough?'.
You can watch and listen to the panellists and the discussion below.
Speakers
Deborah Doane is Director of the World Development Movement, which campaigns for justice and equality for the world's poor. Deborah was a founder and trustee of AntiApathy, and recently joined the Board of the Fairtrade Foundation.
"From the mainstream players, I think Fairtrade can demand more, without losing them... because of the incredible power of the movement behind it." - Deborah Doane
Adam Brett co-founded Tropical Wholefoods, and is a director of Fullwell Mill. He has been a self employed entrepreneur since 1990, working on the development of fair trade food businesses in Uganda, Burkina Faso, Pakistan, Zanzibar and Zambia. He is a Trustee and Judge for the Ashden Awards for Renewable Energy.
"I think [supply chains] are absolutely destined to be inefficient, in an extraordinary way. And conventional economics - of ‘oh yes everything's going to work out, we're going to end up with a nice optimal situation where we're going to live in the best of all possible worlds’ - is completely childish! We actually have to grab our supply chains by the proverbial soft parts and squeeze, to make sure that they work as well as we can possibly make them work." - Adam Brett
Julia Clark is a consultant. As Head of Marketing at Tate & Lyle Sugars, she led the switch of the company’s entire retail sugar range to Fairtrade in 2008. At the time this was the largest ever commitment to Fairtrade by any major UK food or drink brand.
"The people at the bottom of the supply chain are not only disenfranchised and disempowered by the system, their own communities haven't taught them how to grasp opportunities and make much of those opportunities. They're small cane farmers because they don't know how to be anything else. And Fairtrade is starting to teach them how to be business people." - Julia Clark
Robin Murray is an industrial economist and a co-founder and board member of Twin Trading. Twin has established a number of pioneering producer-owned Fairtrade companies, notably Cafédirect, Divine Chocolate, Agrofair UK and Liberation Nuts.
"We're trying to create a different kind of economy. An economy not mediated by markets, but where markets are lodged within a reciprocal or mutual economy." - Robin Murray
Questions and Discussion
"We buy organic Fairtrade dried mangos for about 6 euros a kilo, when it gets to the shop it costs about 25 euros a kilo. So about 22% is going back to the producer. 65% goes straight into supermarkets' pockets." - Adam Brett
"The retail power [of supermarkets] is extraordinary - and it drags us all down with it." - Deborah Doane
The whole debate is also available as a podcast.
