Do you religiously scan the shopping aisles in search of coffee beans and bananas which have undergone rigorous economic, social and environmental analysis? Or are you more in the habit of dumping whichever double chocolate chip muffin looks tastiest into the trolly? Well, chances are you’re among the 57% of Britons who can actually distinguish between a fair trade product and a run-of-the-mill packet of biscuits, so you’re off the hook for now. So what, I hear you ask, is it going to take to haul the other 43% on board?

“It comes down to issues of availability,” said Faith Moll of The Fairtrade Foundation. “There are only just over 3,000 Fairtrade products on the shelves and we’d like to see a lot more than that. We want to make Fairtrade the norm, and for that to happen we need more products, more stockists and more businesses to use Fairtrade.”

Commitment tends to be the key to any cause, and in this case it’s no different. The Fairtrade Foundation have recently celebrated an overwhelming 92% increase in sales from last year. And a further two companies have announced their loyalty to the organisation through replacing their own brands with Fairtrade produce. Martine Julseth of the Fairtrade Foundation explains encouraging new research which indicates hopeful progress.

“We’ve actually commissioned a new survey which shows that a much higher proportion of people now recognize the Fairtrade Mark” she said. ”The actual figure is embargoed until 10^th May, but you could say that over two thirds of the population now recognize the Mark. Growth in recognition echoes growth in sales, which are doubling every two years.”

Commitment enough?

We think not. It seems that the key consumers (that’s you and I, by the way) are passively embarking on a relentless mission of self-indulgence. We’ll go out of our way to buy fair trade coffee just so we can swan into the office – armed with fully-recyclable disposable cup – just so we can look like we’re devoted to something. And we’ll even make a theatrical production out of reaching for the Fairtrade muesli on the top shelf just to prove to ourselves that we care.

But how much are we actually benefiting the lives of farmers and their families in the third world?

“We are benefiting lives of farmers and their families in many ways” said Julseth. ”The most obvious is through the set minimum price which protects farmers against global commodity price fluctuations. Fairtrade also offers farmers access to European markets. But other ways Fairtrade benefits farmers is through the standards. Standards for example have environmental protection elements built in. They also prohibit child labour and require that women are involved in decision making. This in turn helps promote development within communities.”

Photo Credit: Simon Rawles

So, only products carrying the Fairtrade mark ensure producers have received the agreed fair price for the production. Not only that, but the Fairtrade logo guarantees a ‘social premium’ – a sum of money allocated to allow communities to develop and flourish once they have agreed trading with the Fairtrade Foundation.

“The social premium has been used in many ways over the years” explained Julseth. “Communities have democratically decided to spend money on wells, grain stores, computer labs and the like. In Mali a cotton community I met decided to spend their money on building a primary school so that the village children did not have to walk for many kilometres to reach the nearest school. They’re planning to add to this as the premium fund grows.”

The British public might just be getting to grips with this whole fair trade malarkey, right? Well, it’ll take more than the recognition of a Fairtrade logo here and there to cut it, but we’re quickly finding our feet. Such encouraging findings seem to be really influencing our consumption habits.

“Choosing to buy fair trade products was an easy decision for me,” says Leona Morrison (24) of Edinburgh. ”Unfair trade rules cause farmers to suffer by allowing large international companies to buy their produce from them at very low, unreasonable prices in a bid to increase their own profit margins. I believe that this is ethically wrong, and have decided to take a stand against this unfair trade by buying fair trade products.”

 The Fairtrade Foundation are constantly crying out for more volunteers for their nationwide campaigns. And they’re always on the look-out for passionate individuals to transform British towns into Fairtrade towns – towns, villages, countries or boroughs dedicated to putting people before profit in commerce. Did you know St Andrews became a Fairtrade town on the 30^th of November 2005? Or that The University of St Andrews closely followed by gaining Fairtrade status in April of 2006? You can even transform your place of worship into a certified supported of Fairtrade! The possibilities really are endless.

Photo Credit: Simon Rawles

So, what we really need are numbers. People. Bodies. Determined human beings to go out there and campaign for Fairtrade food at staff nights out; students to take a stand and insist upon Fairtrade cotton for the new rugby kits; council officials to boycott the morning meetings until Fairtrade tea is made available.

Click here to get all the resources you need to make a difference in your community.

It’s safe to say we’ve got out work cut out for us if we’re going to apply ourselves to making a difference in the third world. And if knowing we’re enhancing the lives of people thousands of miles away isn’t satisfaction enough, Sainsbury’s Fairtrade double chocolate chip muffin bloody well should be.