Small Farmers. Big Change.

Small banana farmer co-operatives attempting to access international markets are getting dangerously close to their breaking point. The viability – and future – of both these small farmer co-operatives and the independent fair trade importers who struggle to provide consumers with healthy, organic, fair trade bananas is gravely at stake. In fact, if trends continue [...]

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By Hilary Johnson, Equal Exchange Sales Representative Equal Exchange co-owners Scott and River got to ride bikes in banana suits Monday! The highlight of this sartorial adventure was the photograph with Minneapolis Mayor, R.T. Rybak. The event celebrated the expansion of Nice Ride MN, a nonprofit organizer of low-cost bicycle rentals in the Twin Cities. [...]

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By Esther West, Interfaith Program Representative With a swift whip of her machete, Ana Rodriguez deftly broke open a cacao pod in her hand, revealing the inside. “Here,” she instructed me, “try some of the outside layer; it’s very sweet.” The coating covering the cacao beans that would later be fermented, dried, and processed by [...]

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MARISOL ESPINOZA CRUZ IS PERU’S FIRST FEMALE VICE PRESIDENT By Santiago Paz Lopez, Co-Manager of Cepicafe One day, Cepicafe’s history will be written and an important chapter will be the one written about its political positioning and how we broadened our objectives due to the realities we have had to face; and how, together with [...]

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This is Tom Hanlon Wilde’s 7th and final post from Cuzco, Peru “Oh Papi! Where’s Linda, did you bring her?” Emilio said as he greeted me with a big hug. We had dropped 300 meters down the side of the mountain to the home of Emilio and Maria Huillca. The couple had hosted Sparrow Linda [...]

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By Beth Ann Caspersen, Quality Manager I often think about how we are changing the world through trade – with relationships and the belief that everyone has rights, no matter where they are from. It’s easy to get overwhelmed by the complex issues spanning the globe, from myriad protests to governmental conflicts to human right [...]

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At just the moment when President Obama is pushing hard to advance the Colombia – U.S. Free Trade Agreement, the National Security Archive just came out with the following press release claiming that confidential internal memos from Chiquita Brands International “reveal that the banana giant benefited from its payments to Colombian paramilitary and guerrilla groups…” [...]

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The sixth part in Tom Hanlon Wilde’s series from Cuzco, Peru Q: What has been the extremely significant change in the last ten years for the farmers in Aguilayoc? A: The role of off-farm income. All too often, small scale farmers in coffee areas had no other ways to generate meaningful income: outside jobs were [...]

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“We were willing to continue selling our bananas to Dole. We just also wanted to develop our own markets and sell to them directly. We wanted to have a choice and be independent and we wanted to be treated fairly. Dole wouldn’t do it. They said we had to sell them all our bananas or [...]

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The following is the 5th part in Tom Hanlon Wilde’s series of posts from Cuzco, Peru: “Tu cafe es muy bonito (your coffee trees look beautiful),” said Francesca Siena of Mother’s Markets to Yolanda Tapia Carasco of the Aguilayoc Coop as the two stood arm in arm on Yolanda’s patio. Francesca and the rest of [...]

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