About Fair Trade

What is Fair Trade?

Fair Trade is a trading partnership, based on dialogue, transparency and respect, that seeks greater equity in international trade. It contributes to sustainable development by offering better trading conditions to, and securing their rights of, disadvantaged producers and workers – especially in the South. Fair Trade organizations (backed by consumers) are actively engaged in supporting producers in awareness raising and in campaigning for changes in the rules and practices of conventional international trade.

Fair Trade's strategic intent is:

  • Deliberately to work with marginalized producers and workers in order to help them move from a position of vulnerability to security and economic self-sufficiency.
  • To empower producers and workers as stakeholders in their own organizations;
  • Actively to play a wider role in the global arena to achieve greater equity in international trade.

FINE, October 2001

How did it start?

Fair Trade as such has existed since the fifties. It started as a partnership between non-profit importers, retailers in the North and small-scale producers in developing countries. Many of these producers were at the time struggling against low market prices and high dependence on intermediaries. They saw Fair Trade as an opportunity to protect their livelihoods, bypass the middlemen and directly access Northern markets. Over the years, more and more Alternative Trade Organisations (ATOs) were created in different countries, often closely linked to volunteer groups and Worldshops. These networks of ATOs and Worldshops played a vital role in the development of Fair Trade as we know it today.

In 1988, in an effort to expand the distribution of Fair Trade products to mainstream retailers, a Dutch ATO, Solidaridad, found an innovative way to increase sales without compromising consumer trust in Fairtrade products and in their origins. The organization created a label, called Max Havelaar, which guaranteed that the goods met certain labour and environmental standards. The label, first only applied to coffee, was named after a best-selling 19th century book about the exploitation of Javanese coffee plantation workers by Dutch colonial merchants.The concept caught on: within years, similar Labelling Initiatives such as the Fairtrade Foundation, TransFair and Rättvisemärkt, emerged across Europe and North America in an effort to follow Max Havelaar’s footsteps and boost Fairtrade sales. The organizations launched their own campaigns and certification marks and originally operated independently.

In 1997, these organizations created Fairtrade Labelling Organizations International (FLO), an umbrella organization whose mission is to set the Fairtrade standards, support, inspect, certify disadvantaged producers and harmonize the Fairtrade message across the movement.

In 2002, Fairtrade Labelling Organizations launched a new international Fairtrade Certification Mark. The goals of the launch were to improve the visibility of the Mark on supermarket shelves, convey a dynamic, forward-looking image for Fairtrade, facilitate cross border trade, and simplify procedures for importers and traders. The Fairtrade system has always been about global relationships and global standards of fairness - these were recognised for the first time with an international Fairtrade Certification Mark.

The Fairtrade Certification Mark harmonization process is still under way – as of now, all but three Labelling Initiatives have adopted the new international Certification Mark. Full transition to the new Mark should become reality as it gradually replaces the old Certification Marks at various speeds in various countries.

At present, over 20 Labelling Initiatives are members of FLO International. There are now Fairtrade Certification Marks on dozens of different products, based on FLO’s certification for coffee, tea, rice, bananas, mangoes, cocoa, cotton, sugar, honey, fruit juices, nuts, fresh fruit, quinoa, herbs and spices, wine and footballs etc.