Clothes for a Change

• Background Info

Organic Empowerment 2010

10 Strategic Local Campaigns

#4 - Organic, Fair Trade & Union Made Procurement

TAKE ACTION: Urge your local elected officials to support organic, fair trade & union made procurement.

The link above will give you a form to contact your local elected officials, but it does not contain a pre-written letter. Please write your own letter or copy this form letter:

FORM LETTER:

I'm concerned that the government contracts our city oversees may be going to sweatshops rather than the organic, fair trade and union businesses we should be supporting. I'm writing you, as my representative in local government, to urge you to making sure that our government contracts for goods and services prioritize organic, fair trade and union made products. Here's how:

• Adopt a "sweatfree" purchasing policy to stop our local tax dollars from subsidizing sweatshops and abusive child labor.
• Become a Fair Trade Town.

• Support Farm to School programs, like Muskegon Area Advocates for Healthy School Meals in MI.
• Direct publicly-funded hospitals to contract for organic food, as MedAssets has done for the 2,000 hospitals it services.
• Reverse bans on organic in programs like WIC.
• Make sure that food stamps can be used at local organic food stores and farmers markets.
• Direct school districts and community colleges to purchase only organic and fair made products.

• Pass a resolution mandating organic and fair made purchasing for municipal contracts.
• Support socially responsible businesses that can certify that their products are organic and Fair Made.
• Limit vending at community events to local, organic and fair made products.

Thank you for your attention to this important cause.

About Clothes for a Change (CFAC)

OCA and our allies have launched a new global campaign to raise awareness about the negative health and environmental effects of conventional and genetically engineered cotton and the institutionalized exploitation of clothing sweatshops.

By uniting organic consumers, anti-genetic engineering activists, trade unionists, religious social justice advocates, progressives in the fashion & apparel industry, and the Fair Trade / anti-sweatshop communities into a potent force we can change the dynamics of the marketplace and fundamentally alter public policy.

The Clothes for a Change Campaign Is Demanding that Major Clothing Retailers & Manufacturers:

• Stop using genetically engineered cotton.
• Start blending in certified organic or "transition to organic" cotton in their clothing.
• Guarantee that they meet independently verified Fair Labor (non-sweatshop) standards.
• Eliminate all production and export cotton subsidies in the U.S. and convert to Green subsidies for organic and transition to organic cotton production.

While the OCA and our allies put marketplace pressure on the clothing giants, we will also be enlisting public interest groups to support the campaign by:

• Committing to procure non-sweatshop, environmentally sound products.
• Signing-on in support of the core demands of the Clothes for a Change campaign.

LINKS

SUSTAINABLE COTTON PRODUCTION

• Sustainable Cotton Project - Information about farmers, manufacturers, activists, retailers and others who are devoting their energies to making organic cotton a viable agricultural and economic alternative.
• Behind the Label - Promoting the collective bargaining power of both workers in sweatshops and communities of consumers.
• The Organic Cotton Directory - Directory of companies selling organic cotton products
• International Organic Cotton Directory -Directory locates links in the organic cotton chain: organic agricultural input suppliers, farmers, gins, mills & retailers of organic cotton products.

LABOR ISSUES & SWEATSHOP INFO

• National Labor Committee - Educating & engaging the public on human & labor rights abuses by corporations.
• Global Exchange - Human rights organization dedicated to promoting environmental, political, and social justice around the world.
• Workers Rights Consortium (WRC) - A non-profit organization created by college and university administrations, students and labor rights experts on over 100 campuses. The WRC's purpose is to ensure that factories producing clothing and other goods bearing college and university names respect the basic rights of workers.
• Campaign for Labor Rights (CLR) - Working to inform and mobilize grassroots activists in solidarity with major, international anti-sweatshop struggles. CLR has been called the "grassroots mobilizing department" of the anti-sweatshop movement
• UNITE! Fighting for good jobs everywhere. Our union is supporting workers in other countries who are fighting to organize their own unions to improve wages and working conditions.
• Clean Clothes Campaign Campaignind to improve working conditions in the garment industry.
• SweatX A new line of "sweat-free" casual active wear. Designed and manufactured entirely within Los Angeles, SweatX clothing is made by teamX inc., an employee owned, and unionized garment factory

Visit the CFAC Background InfO Page