Fair Trade & Social Justice
OCA's New Fair World Project
The Organic Consumers Association launched the Fair World Project (FWP) in September 2010 to promote fair trade in commerce, especially in organic production systems in developing countries as well as at home, and to protect the term "fair trade" from dilution and misuse for mere PR purposes. FWP fills the critical need for a watchdog of misleading fair trade claims, and a cheerleader for dedicated fair trade mission-driven companies.
Using data from the Census Bureau, NPR made a map of the most common job in each state. The award for top job goes, overwhelmingly, to truck drivers… who knew? Truck driver was the most common job in 29 out of 50 states.
Part of the commonality has to do with the way the jobs are categorized by the government. The truck driver category includes all delivery people, which is an understandably large category.
Still, truck driving is resistant to both globalization and automation, which has protected it from much of the declines seen in other industries. As NPR pointed out,
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ROME, - “We do not inherit the Earth from our ancestors, we borrow it from our children” – an ancient Indian saying that encapsulates the essence of sustainability as seen by the world’s indigenous people.
With their deep and locally-rooted knowledge of the natural world, indigenous peoples have much to share with the rest of the world about how to live, work and cultivate in a sustainable manner that does not jeopardise future generations.
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shrim farmers
I vowed never to touch another Thai-farmed shrimp after attending a panel discussion recently at the SeaWeb Seafood Summit in New Orleans.
Steve Trent, the executive director of Britain’s Environmental Justice Foundation, described a multi-billion-dollar industry with a financial model that would not be viable without slave labor. “It’s the most horrific situation I have seen in more than 25 years of monitoring human rights abuses around the world,” he said.
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Heifer International has worked for more than 70 years helping people all over the world gain the tools they need to improve their livelihoods. The core of their model is “Passing on the Gift”, meaning the communities they work with must continue to help others, giving new communities their animals’ offspring and training them, in a never-ending series of helping others.
Food Tank was fortunate enough to speak with Pierre Ferrari, CEO of Heifer International since 2010.
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Suppose that by enacting a particular law we’d increase the U.S.Gross Domestic Product. But almost all that growth would go to the richest 1percent.
The rest of us could buy some products cheaper than before. But those gains would be offset by losses of jobs and wages.
This is pretty much what “free trade” has brought us over the last two decades.
I used to believe in trade agreements. That was before the wages of most Americans stagnated and a relative few at the top captured just about all the economic gains.
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The current climate crisis is urgent, but solutions to address it already exist: small-scale farmers can cool the planet as they feed the world. Contribute now to help us at Fair World Project spread this message of hope and promote critical work!
With your contributions, we’ll distribute a new image created by political artist, Favianna Rodriguez especially for this campaign and complete and distribute our short documentary, featuring Vandana Shiva and other food sovereignty luminaries, on how small-scale farmers can mitigate climate change through regenerative organic agriculture
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A young blonde woman weeps openly on camera, her manicured fingers perched wanly against her cheekbones. “I can’t take it any more,” she sobs in Norwegian. “What sort of life is this?” Her name is
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On New Year’s Day, 20 states raised their minimum wages. That leaves a lot of states that aren’t increasing the minimum wage - along with the federal government.
Even some of those employees who are getting increases don’t have much to celebrate. Workers in Florida might barely notice their 12-cents-an-hour raise. And the extra 15 cents an hour in Montana, Arizona, and Missouri will be wiped out with inflation and climbing costs before the first paycheck is deposited.
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The law is catching up with Ronald McDonald.
On Friday, the National Labor Relations Board issued 13 complaints involving 78 charges by workers that McDonald’s USA, LLC, and many of its franchisees broke the law by interfering with collective efforts to organize and improve working conditions.
The complaints will now go to trial before administrative law judges , who could, for the first time, find McDonald’s guilty of violating workers’ right to
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