Fair Trade Supporter Newsletter (January 2022)

Due to the global uncertainties and travel restrictions caused by COVID-19 pandemic, the Fair Trade Summit in Berlin has been moved to August 2022. The new date of the Summit is 23-26 August 2022. Through our crowdfunding campaign we have been able to raise over €20K to help Fair Trade Enterprises from across the world to come to Berlin and attend the Summit. Thank you to everyone who stood by the Fair Trade community and supported our efforts to unlock new opportunities for Fair Trade Enterprises.

In January 2020 at an event at UNCTAD in Geneva, WFTO launched a major new report co-authored with Cambridge University, University of York and Traidcraft Exchange on business models, uncovering new insights from across the WFTO community of Fair Trade Enterprises.

Here are the key insights about Fair Trade Enterprises found:

• 92% reinvest all profits in their social mission
• 52% are led by women
• 4 times less likely to go bankrupt
• 85% report actively sacrificing financial goals to pursue social or environmental goals, while retaining commercial viability.

The report can be found through this link.

This month we are traveling to Uruguay to meet Manos del Uruguay, an organisation founded to give Uruguay's rural women jobs and an opportunity to personally develop and gain independence, while preserving their traditions and using skills they inherited from previous generations and raw materials (wool). All profits are shared among the cooperatives or re-invested in the organisation to benefit the local communities. Watch their story here.

On the 26th of January 2022, the European Parliament Fair Trade Working Group hosted a discussion on ???????????????????????? ????????????????????, ???????????????? ????????????????????????? The European Union has now a new Trade Policy and a historic challenge: delivering in its commitment to develop a trade model which is fair, sustainable and puts the people and Planet above profit. Two of the key components of this much needed approach to trade are Trade and Sustainable Development (TSD) policies, including the TSD chapters of trade agreements, and binding human rights and environmental due diligence. This event aimed to deepen on how each of these policies must work in practice to deliver improved livelihoods for small farmers, artisans and workers in global value chains.
To know more about this event, please follow this link.