Fair Trade on FOX 2

A video highlighting MacroSun International and fair trade from Fox 2 News St. Louis.

We don't always know it, but sometimes the products we purchase can put money in the pockets of bad people. It turns out there are also things you can buy which can do a lot of good, too. In the Fox Files, Paul Schankman shows us some of the places in St. Louis that are part of a movement called 'fair trade'. At about a dozen St. Louis cafes coffee drinkers are helping people all over the world ease their daily grind, and they may not even know it. It's called fair trade. "Fair trade means the farmers that sell us the beans get a fair price." Fair trade has been around for a while, but it's just become popular the past few years, which is why a lot of customers still need shopkeepers to explain it. Lynn Josse, People's Coffee, "The farmers who produce fair trade coffee are guaranteed a minimum amount of money and they come up with programs to put it back into the community." What fair trade does for coffee growers is create cooperatives of farmers who are paid a few cents more a pound for their coffee if they promise to put their profits to good use; building bridges or schools or whatever the community needs. Elise Labarge, coffee drinker, "I think it is a wonderful idea. I think there is a lot of room for that same idea of fair trade throughout the city." Although coffee shops get a lot of the fair trade notoriety, there are other businesses that practice it, like Macrosun International in the U-City Loop. Here, the product is crafts and clothing from India and Asia. "I think that you can do business, treat people fairly and still make a profit." Owner Gil Williams travels for months at a time, fair trading with artisans all over the world. By purchasing the items himself, he believes he is helping people in those third world countries avoid exploitation by large wholesalers and sweatshops. "If there's not fair trade, it is almost a kind of almost slavery. It really is, because they are almost indentured servants, the young kids, and it is not a level playing field." One of Macrosun's suppliers has now made enough money from its sales and donations from Gil's customers to start a children's center in Katmandu. "People who shop here are supporting this... No question." But in the grand scheme of things, are fair traders really making a difference? "Whether or not these policies are likely to be effective, I think, depends on the particular form that they take." SLU economist Bonnie Wilson says fair trade, while high minded, could also create problems. "If you send it to an individual in the form of paying a higher price for coffee, you introduce distortions into the market pricing system and the market pricing system, under certain circumstances, works very well." According to Doctor Wilson, donating to aid organizations, which can help those same people more efficiently, is a better idea. But fair traders prefer doing business one on one, insisting they are doing a lot of good; to the last drop. Generally speaking, fair trade merchants say they do not pass along their extra costs to the customer because they figure people will then choose something else priced lower.

Category:

Travel & Events

Tags:

• MacroSun
• Fair Trade