Fairtrade Foundation Wins Charity of The Year

The Fairtrade Foundation is embarking on a three-year push to encourage the out-of-home sector to offer more products with the FAIRTRADE Mark and to promote them to their customers. The aim is to mirror the success of Fairtrade products in the grocery market, in the fast growing catering and food service sector. The drive comes as figures show that the Fairtrade Foundation is set to meet its target of doubling Fairtrade sales every two years, with overall sales of products certified by the Fairtrade Foundation for the first six months of this year reaching £63 million, equivalent to sales for the whole of 2002.

The Fairtrade Foundation hopes to alert food service and catering companies to the increased number and range of Fairtrade certified products, and to the developments that now make it very easy for them to stock and promote products with the FAIRTRADE Mark. The organization is launching a new directory of over 100 companies that supply Fairtrade certified products to the food service industry, available at www.fairtrade.org.uk/suppliers_caterers.htm . Eating places are also being encouraged to display the fact that they are serving Fairtrade through new promotional point-of-sale materials - posters, table talkers, coffee mats and window stickers – produced by the Fairtrade Foundation and available through distributors and wholesalers.

“Fairtrade is already growing rapidly in the out-of-home sector, but there’s a long way to go before consumers have the same choice of products with the FAIRTRADE Mark when eating out as they have for their weekly shop,” says Ian Bretman, Deputy Director of the Fairtrade Foundation. “Nearly half of what we spend on food and drink is consumed outside the home so we are asking workplaces, coffee houses, restaurants, etc. to stock Fairtrade certified products and to use the display materials to inform their customers that premises are using Fairtrade certified products.”

The trend for Fairtrade is already well established in some parts of the out-of-home sector; Costa Coffee, Pret A Manger and Starbucks all offer their customers a Fairtrade coffee option and, last month, in another first for Fairtrade, Marks & Spencer secured Fairtrade certification for all coffee sold in their in-store Café Revive chain.

Launching the Café Revive Fairtrade blend across 198 outlets in September 2004, David Gregory, Head of Food Technology at Marks & Spencer, said: ”In the same way that we changed to using only free-range eggs in all our products, we are switching to Fairtrade coffee in response to demand from our customers. All coffee sold in our chain of Café Revives will be certified by the Fairtrade Foundation. Its unique quality will remain the same.” One of the aims of the Fairtrade Foundation’s three-year push is to emphasise that switching to Fairtrade does not mean any concession on quality.

As part of the three-year drive, the Fairtrade Foundation will also target companies with Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) policies to highlight Fairtrade as a very simple way to further the aims of such policies, pointing out that the price difference is minimal. Companies like Microsoft, Orange and Merrill Lynch have already switched to Fairtrade certified coffee in their offices, but so have more cost-conscious public and not-for-profit organizations like the YHA (Youth Hostels Association), in their 200 Youth Hostels across England and Wales, and the Salvation Army, with 800 centres throughout the UK.

“Every day the Fairtrade Foundation gets calls from both end users and catering suppliers about how they can purchase and offer Fairtrade certified products,” says Mr Bretman. “They tell us that demand for Fairtrade is going through the roof as consumers who buy Fairtrade products for use at home are demanding the same choice at work or when eating out, while companies and businesses increasingly see Fairtrade products as part of their wider CSR programmes.”

Fairtrade received another major boost earlier this year when the Office of Government Commerce issued guidelines on how to procure Fairtrade certified products under current EC Procurement Directives. These offer guidance to government departments and their associated agencies on how to ensure the inclusion of sustainable and ethical criteria - rather than just cost - when purchasing products.

The Fairtrade Foundation is expecting its autumn push to be particularly popular with businesses and Fairtrade supporters in the 70 ‘Fairtrade Towns’, where groups work feverishly to promote Fairtrade in the community. The Fairtrade Towns initiative started in 2001 when Garstang, a small town in Lancashire, declared itself a Fairtrade Town. The Fairtrade Foundation then started the Fairtrade Towns campaign whereby towns have to complete five goals to achieve Fairtrade status. These involve serving Fairtrade products at local council meetings and in a specified number of eating places, workplaces and community organisations relative to the size of population.

Notes to Editors
1. Other workplaces which have switched to Fairtrade tea and coffee include Astra Zeneca, Eversheds, the Nationwide Building Society, the British Medical Association, and Thames Water.

2. Catering company Scholarest is making Fairtrade products available to 550 universities.

3. Glastonbury Festival 2004 blazed a trail for festivals around the UK by requiring all food stalls to sell Fairtrade coffee and hot chocolate. Working with Fairtrade supplier Cafeology, the FAIRTRADE Mark was displayed on stalls throughout the festival grounds.

4. The five goals to achieve Fairtrade Town status are 1: Local council to pass a resolution supporting Fairtrade, and agree to serve Fairtrade coffee and tea at its meetings and in its offices and canteens 2: A range of Fairtrade products is readily available in the area’s shops; Fairtrade products are served in local cafés/catering establishments 3: Fairtrade products are used by a number of local work places (estate agents, hairdressers etc) and community organisations (churches, schools etc) 4: Devise a plan to attract popular support for the campaign 5: A local Fairtrade steering group is convened to ensure continued commitment to its Fairtrade Town status.

For more information, please phone 020 7440 7686/ 07770 957 451 or email eileen.maybin@fairtrade.org.uk or abi.murray@fairtrade.org.uk

The Fairtrade Foundation, Room 204, 16 Baldwin’s Gardens, London EC1N 7RJ.
Tel: 020 7405 5942 Fax: 020 7405 5943 Web: www.fairtrade.org.uk

he Fairtrade Foundation won the Charity of the Year award at the Fifth Annual UK Charity Awards ceremony held at the Grosvenor House Hotel, Park Lane, London last night (Friday 24 September).

The UK Charity Awards, organised by Charity Times magazine, has 16 award categories including Lifetime Achievement, Best New Charity and Volunteer of the Year. This year's winners included stories of personal courage and dedication in every field of not-for-profit endeavour.

Hosting the ceremony, Jennie Bond (formerly BBC Royal Correspondent) said the judges commended the Fairtrade Foundation for taking Fairtrade ahead as one of the UK’s most active grassroots social movements.

“The Fairtrade Foundation is now celebrating its 10th anniversary,” she said, “and has reached this milestone, bigger and bolder, becoming both a household name and an international phenomenon that reaches 5 million farmers and their families across 48 countries. Thanks to the work of The Fairtrade Foundation, it is the UK that continues to drive the worldwide success of Fairtrade.”

The Fairtrade Foundation was set up in the early 1990s and the first product with the FAIRTRADE Mark appeared on supermarket shelves in 1994. There are now 300 Fairtrade products in product categories which include coffee, tea, cocoa, chocolate, snacks and biscuits, sugar, honey, fruit juice and fresh fruit. According to the latest MORI poll conducted in March, 39 per cent of the UK public now recognize the FAIRTRADE Mark and sales, which are expected to exceed £100m for 2004, are increasing by 50 per cent year on year.

Accepting the prestigious award, Executive Director Harriet Lamb said: “This is a tribute to the producers at the heart of Fairtrade, and to each and every member of the public who puts products with the FAIRTRADE Mark into their shopping baskets and enjoys them when they get home.”

“Surveys have shown that many people learn about Fairtrade by word of mouth,” she added. “The honour of winning also goes to all those people throughout the country who do so much to raise awareness of Fairtrade and how it improves the lives of farmers and producers and their families around the world.”

The gala dinner event was attended by more than 700 people involved with the UK charity sector, industry representatives and celebrities. The Fairtrade Foundation was nominated by the Co-operative Group. Sales of Fairtrade products at the Co-op have risen from £100,000 in 1998 to £12.4m in 2003.

For further information please contact:
Eileen Maybin on 020 7440 7686, mobile 07770 957451 (eileen.maybin@fairtrade.org.uk)
or Abi Murray on 020 7440 7679 (abi.murray@fairtrade.org.uk)

Notes to Editors
The Fairtrade Foundation is the UK member of Fairtrade Labelling Organisations International (FLO). Other countries with FLO member organisations are Austria, Belgium, Canada, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Ireland, Italy, Japan, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Norway, Sweden, Switzerland and the USA - with new members for Mexico and Australia/New Zealand.