I’m on my way to El Salvador and Honduras to visit our cashew co-op partners. Sadly, we got word last week that “unseasonable” rains and winds have destroyed 75% of this year’s cashew crop and the co-op in Salvador (Aprainores) has had to shut down their processing plant after just two weeks; laying off the 60 or so women whose income depends on the plant. Instead of the 60,000 or so pounds of cashews that Aprainores was planning to export this year, they will export nothing.

Very sad indeed.

This is the precarious nature of a small farmer co-op, becoming increasingly more difficult every day due to climate change.

It’s also the challenge for Alternative Trade Organizations, like Equal Exchange, that work hard to build these supply chains: working closely with our farmer co-op partners in the south and then just as diligently in the north where everything depends on an informed, educated and engaged citizen-consumer  and a retailer whose values, principles, and behaviors match our own.

On both ends of the supply chain, the bigger context is also becoming increasingly more challenging as government agriculture and trade policies, climate change, and the corporatization of the food system create an unwelcoming set of conditions to be navigated.  Despite the challenges however, the rays of hope and community shine through:  our model of alternative trade, authentic fair trade, a new economy- whatever you like to call it – will persevere because it is built on relationships, community, a concern for the planet, and a system which is based on the principle that people come before profits.

To quote our friends on the banana team, at OKE USA:  please look beyond the seal!  Ask questions before you purchase.  When we behave as engaged citizens – not just as consumers – we can awaken the sleeping giant and create the world we envision.

In honor of World Fair Trade Day, our friends at the Fair World Project have created this excellent 4-minute video that tells the story of authentic fair trade:  what it’s about; why it’s important to support organized small farmer co-operatives; and how we, consumers-citizens, can begin to take back our food system.

The motto, “Food For People Not Profits,” has never been more critical than it is today.  Behind the scenes, unbeknownst to most of us, corporations are controlling more and more of the way in which our food is grown, distributed, and sold to us.  We believe it is time to come together and fight back.  We can do this partly by supporting people-centric alternative supply chains from small farmers, to worker-owned democratically-run businesses, to natural food stores and co-operatives that actually care about people and the planet.

After watching the video, click here to learn more about Fair World Project and World Fair Trade Day, and if that’s not enough, how you can win a year supply of fair trade products!

On March 3, 2016, environmentalist and human rights activist Berta Cáceres was murdered in her home in Honduras. Berta was internationally recognized for her leadership in opposing a World Bank-financed dam project that would have devastated the lands where she and other indigenous Lenca people live.  In 2015, she  was awarded the Goldman Environmental Prize.

Daniel Fireside, Equal Exchange’s Capital Coordinator, spent several weeks on a speaking tour with Berta in 2001, ending at a massive protest in Quebec City against a failed attempt by George W Bush and other presidents to establish a hemisphere-wide free trade agreement.  He wrote this remembrance of Berta, whose courageous activism against the U.S.-backed military and economic oligarchy of Honduras and assassination has sparked renewed global attention to her work to defend the economic, political, cultural, and environmental rights of Hondurans and others fighting for global justice and solidarity.

To read Daniel’s article, click here.

To support Berta’s work, please visit Rights Action.

Equal Exchange buys significant amounts of coffee from Honduras.  Read here about some of the work we are doing with one of our small farmer coffee partners, COMSA.

On April 19th, WBEZ Chicago aired the following 19 minute radio interview about the conventional banana industry (owned and controlled by just a handful of multinational conglomerates like Dole and Chiquita) and the small farmer alternative which places small farmers, ethical retailers, and engaged consumers center stage in a growing movement.

One banana:  Two very different paths.  Which one do you choose?

Worldview

The Banana Supply Chain And The Movement To Change It

April 19, 2016

Courtesy of Katherine Nagasawa, Leah Varjacques

A banana farm worker in Ecuador weighs and washes the fruit. Today, Ecuador exports 32 percent of the world’s bananas.

By Frankie Pondolph, Equal Exchange Sales Representative

Frankie Pondolph and Laurie Foote, Equal Exchange Sales Representatives, with Naama Haviv, Executive Director of the Panzi Foundation USA

It was a humbling experience to represent Equal Exchange, along with my co-worker Laurie, at the honorary reception of Dr. Denis Mukwege for his work at the Panzi hospital in Bukavu, Democratic Republic of the Congo. Dr. Mukege has been awarded the 2016 Reinfield Award on behalf of the University of Pennsylvania’s School of Nursing for his work in Women’s Global Health. The hospital attempts to provide a sanctuary for healing, both physically and mentally for all those affected by the violence in the DNC.

Equal Exchange’s connection to the Panzi Hospital was formed in 2011 through the Congo Coffee Project, a collaboration between Equal Exchange and the Panzi Foundation. Through this project, Equal Exchange brings Congolese coffee to the U.S. market; with the aim of raising awareness of the crimes of sexual violence committed every day in the DRC.  Through sales of our Congo Coffee, we have also raised more than $60,000 to directly support the work being done to help victims of this violence heal.

Last evening, I was among fifteen or so people from across the United States who were in some way connected to, or inspired by, the work of the Panzi Hospital. Executive Director of the Panzi Foundation USA, Naama Haviv, spoke chillingly of her work with Dr. Mukwege and the strategic efforts Panzi USA is doing to advocate for the women, children and men affected by sexual violence. Naama spoke of the word “empowerment” as something that cannot be given, as in “to empower,” but rather, true empowerment is something that can only be found within oneself.

Laurie and Frankie, with Dr. Denis Mukwege

Dr. Mukwege then spoke of his work at the Panzi Hospital to physically heal women who have been sexually abused. His work to heal the victims affected by the horrific violence committed in the DRC is only a piece of the puzzle towards greater healing and social justice. Dr. Mukwege defined justice as the ability to use one’s voice to speak out and through this action, to create an opportunity to heal.

Dr. Mukwege remarked that too many people today close their eyes and ears to the injustices around the world; what one cannot see or hear does not exist. As I stood next to the group of fifteen likeminded people attending the reception, I reflected on our ability to use our voices. Dr. Mukwege reminded us all this evening that each one of us has something to give and that something is the ability to speak out about what is happening every day in the Congo. I will be encouraging people to use their voices as tools for their own empowerment, and to take action. The Congo Coffee project and the work of Dr. Mukwege and the Panzi Foundation are vehicles we can all use to collectively open our ears and eyes to what is happening, to call attention to these crimes, and to demand justice.