In the News

Consumer awareness of Fairtrade increases, says survey

ConfectionaryNews.com
05/12/2008

By Linda Rano

Recent research commissioned by the Fairtrade Foundation suggests that the UK public is increasingly aware of Fairtrade chocolate... 

One in four of the UK's shoppers now regularly buy several Fairtrade products: "The trend is for more people to be buying more products more regularly," said the Foundation... 

Fairtrade also puts the increased sales down to greater awareness of Fairtrade delivered through a "grassroots social movement", with communities, religious groups, universities and schools campaigning for Fairtrade in their area.

Illegal child labor in Mexico puts food on tables of Americans

Arizona Republic
05/09/2008

MEXICO CITY - Ten-year-old Adriana Salgado spends her days in a field in northwestern Mexico, picking the spinach, cabbage and other vegetables that fill American salad bowls. Adriana doesn't know how to read. She attends school for only one hour a day.

Her 15-year-old sister, who works with her, can't read, either. Adriana had an 8-year-old brother, too, until he was crushed to death by a tractor while working in a tomato field last year.

Burger With a Side of Spies

New York Times
05/07/2008

While the Patriot Act has raised fears about government spying on ordinary citizens, the growing threat to civil liberties posed by corporate spying has received much less attention. During the late 1990s, a private security firm spied on Greenpeace and other environmental groups, examining activists’ phone records and even sending undercover agents to infiltrate the groups, according to an article in Mother Jones. In 2006 Hewlett-Packard was caught spying on journalists. Last year Wal-Mart apologized for improperly recording conversations with a New York Times reporter.

Make a green statement with your next bouquet

Seattle Times
05/03/2008

Natural and biodegradable, flowers were a "green" product before that concept even existed. But the growth of cut flowers in recent years into a $40 billion industry has relied heavily on chemical pesticides and fertili-zers, as well as far-flung global production.Now the green-living movement has finally reached the vase on your dining-room table. Eco-friendly and socially-responsible flowers are becoming more available, stimulated by blossoming consumer demand.

Is There Any Way to Stop Wal-Mart & Co. from Sweatshop Profiteering?

Washington Monthly
04/29/2008

I remember one particularly bad factory in China. It produced outdoor tables, parasols, and gazebos, and the place was a mess. Work floors were so crowded with production materials that I could barely make my way from one end to the other. In one area, where metals were being chemically treated, workers squatted at the edge of steaming pools as if contemplating a sudden, final swim. The dormitories were filthy: the hallways were strewn with garbage—orange peels, tea leaves—and the only way for anyone to bathe was to fill a bucket with cold water.

Groups discuss alleged ills of Wal-Mart purchasing

Press & Guide (Dearborn, MI)
04/20/2008

Excerpt from article:

 
The workers have spoken at a number of events throughout the Midwest during a tour that took them to churches, universities, and community centers in 10 cities. Wal-Mart last month opened a Supercenter on Ford Road in Dearborn near the Southfield Freeway.

The tour is co-sponsored by a number of local community groups, the International Labor Rights Forum and SweatFree Communities.

Group focuses on working conditions

Kalamazoo Gazette
04/17/2008

Excerpt from article:

OSHTEMO TOWNSHIP -- The glass doors to the Wal-Mart Supercenter's sprawling food section slide open and Didier Leiton steps inside.

The Costa Rica native doesn't do his food shopping in places nearly so massive, yet in a way, he is intimately familiar with some of the produce before him at the Ninth Street store near Kalamazoo.

A pile of pineapples is stacked in front of him, for $2.98 each. He grabs one with his left hand and reads the label... 

 

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