FAIRTRADE and other Interests

Usually I follow a good few interests. Actually most of those I treasure since many decades. That makes me look very ancient ... .
Now as I m early 'dinosaur stage', like being over 50, I must agree, age doesn't hurt, if you are healthy, doesn't matter and anyway, who says that you have to act your age.

Coming back to my 'hobbies' or 'passions' I can say that I love farming ( I was 4 when I decided to become a farmer ), gardening, animals and plants, flora and fauna in general, but also swimming and cycling, hiking ( all leisurely ), traveling, writing ( amateur ) and controversial enough also motorbiking. But on some topics I will compose a special ode ... :) at a later stage.

This blog should highlight especially one topic, which is close to my heart since the late Eighties:

From 23.th of February till the 8.th of March, Fairtrade International celebrates 'Fairtrade Fortnight' 2015.

Since 2007 Tubbercurry has been officialy a Fairtrade town and it used to be for some years the smallest Fairtrade town in Ireland. I joined it maybe a year later and we used to be a bunch of different people meeting up regularly and planing events especially around the annual Fairtrade fortnight. But then 2012 things changed drastically and apart from myself all other members either moved away or had other priorities. At a meeting where I wasn't present, I was elected to the new chairperson ..... . Suddenly I found myself as the 'captain' and all the crew had been gone ... .
But as Fairtrade has become one of my 'inner circle interest' over the last 27 years, I gave it a try and we are now a small and rather active group again, but with no particular structure.... it's a group where everybody is welcome and to say it formally, we haven't reached our capacity yet ... ( hint, hint ).

This week we are especially excited, as on Friday, the 27th of February, 'Chief Adam', a Cashew nut grower from Ghana, also a member of Fairtrade International and an UN climate change advocate, will come to Tubbercurry, together with Dunstan, a member of Fairtrade Ireland. We asked them to speak at three venues, which I m aware off, is quite a lot. But kindly they agreed and so he speaks first in front of National School Children, then Transition Year students at the local Secondary School ( which already has Fairtrade status ) and finally there is an open talk at the North Connaught College, our local third level institute. It should be of great interest to hear from a person, who's own life, the life of his family and community has been positively influenced simply by receiving a fair price  for his goods.
Today at a talk in the Secondary School, a student related Fairtrade to collecting money for charity and asked how we send off the money we collected. But the great thing is that its none of this rattling of buckets and asking for contributions business .... it is simply working by getting a fair price. Often small farmers with only a few acres have no change to compete with big Multinational Companies who dictate the global market prices. But they work hard, have pride in their product and deliver a delicious product, often even with organic standards. I believe, we as their consumers owe them a fair price, it is as simple as that, it's not hard to understand and there is no excuse.
If you are interested in this subject, why not click onto www.fairtrade.ie or fairtrade.net. There are videos, campaigns, products and also guidelines if you want to get involved.
There is a wide range of products available in most retailing outlets, but there still has a lot to be done. My favorites are tea, coffee, sugar, cadburys dairy milk, maltesers, cocoa in general and the best chocolate you ever get is clonakiltychocolate.com. Then surely bananas and if your local retailer doesn't have them join in this years campaign, online or there are also postcards available. Maybe your town is Fairtrade too?

It was a bit different when I first got in contact with an early form of fairtrade. In 1989, I attended a solidarity protest in aid of Nicaragua in the former German capital of Bonn. That time Nicaragua was boycotted by many western governments, mainly the USA  ( Reagan area ), because they intended to establish a left wing, communist government. A kind of a civil war between the pro american Contras and the Sandinistas not only claimed the lives of 30000 people, but an international boycott weakened the economy and made it difficult for farmers to sell their main product (coffee) internationally. At that demonstration there was also a stall with coffee from Nicaragua and I bought some and subscribed to get that coffee delivered monthly. Even though I have to admit, that the coffee was very strong, deep black and had a bitter note, I felt I did the right thing and kept the standing order until we moved to Ireland.
In the early Nineties, there was a pre-fairtrade organization active within Ireland. It was called 'traideireann' and sold their products in very few outlets throughout the country. During the annual 'old fair day' in Tubbercurry I used to rent a stall together with a friend of mine. We were also both members of the Ballina Amnesty International Group and divided the stall in two half's ... one with petitions and information of Amnesty and the other one we sold fair traded goods.
Thanks to the 'old fair day' committee I m still at it during our heritage week.

probably 1991 our stall at the Tubbercurry Old Fair day

...and she is still at it .... 2014 at the Old fair day

Sometimes people wonder seriously what I do get out of this type of activity. Nothing really, because often it is very weary, to convince an adult, why he/she might consider changing their consumer habit. But I have hope yet, especially when a six year old is aware of the Fairtrade logo and picks a bar or tells his Mum to buy Fairtrade bananas because he/she knows it's only FAIR ... don't we all sometimes wish to live in a fairer world?