It may be a great

deal...but who is
paying the price?
BASILDON GROUP URGES SHOPPERS TO THINK OF POOR
PRODUCERS DURING NATIONAL FAIRTRADE FORTNIGHT
H
OW much better does
your meal taste when
you eat it with a clean
conscience?
The Fairtrade movement helps
farmers in poor countries, who
are often the victims of the
Wests hunger for cheap food
deals.
Take bananas, for example.
While a worker sweats in an
Ecuadorian plantation, hacking
bananas fromplants and packing
them into crates for an oppres-
sively low wage, the fruits of his
labours are being bought by
Europe at a lowprice that is trap-
ping him in poverty.
Loose bananas are available in
Tesco for as little as 12p each.
Thats less than an individual
apple grown in this country,
which averages 20p.
But how is this possible, when
they are shipped around the
globe and the cost of producing
them has more than doubled?
The answer is that supermar-
kets, locked in a price war, are all
too happy to make a loss if it
means you, the customer, keeps
coming back for the rest of your
groceries.
But this reverse marketing is
not victimless.
Banana plantations, the major-
ity of which are in Colombia,
Dominican Republic and
Ecuador, take the brunt of the
negative economics. They receive
a nominal amount for their prod-
uct and this, coupled with spi-
ralling production and importa-
tioncosts, and anincreasing
cost of living, means their liveli-
hood is stripped to the bone, as
salaries and working conditions
suffer.
Thanks to Fairtrade, the fight
to improve the lives of poor work-
ers thousands of miles away can
begin in your own high street.
In 2005, a Fairtrade steering
group was set up in Basildon and
two years later the town was
granted the status.
Since then, it has continued to
work to raise awareness of ethi-
cally-produced goods.
Its never the supermarkets or
big businesses that lose out,
says group leader Linda
Williams.
Our mission is education
getting people to think about
how they shop and how they can
help give a little premium that
affects real peoples lives.
It means they can get togeth-
er in co-ops and negotiate bet-
ter prices. They can invest
their premium in
b u i l d i n g
schools or
g e t t i n g
c l e a n
water.
We are three quarters of the
way through the national Fair-
trade fortnight, which runs until
Sunday, and the Basildon group
has just held its annual cook-off,
a regular fixture in its awareness
drive.
In the kitchens at De La Salle
school, Basildon, three catering
students pitted their culinary
skills against one another,
using recipes that
incorporated Fair-
trade ingredients.
Each student
prepared and
cooked two dish-
es, a main course
and a dessert,
and their meals
were tasted and
judged by Darren
Bennett of the
Magic Mushroom
restaurant, at Barley-
lands, Billericay.
Contestants included Jody
Ellis, 15, of James Hornsby
school, who made a chicken
roulade and French apple tart,
and Sinead Burton, 16, from De
La Salle school, who cooked veg-
etable sushi as her main and
chocolate fondant with strawber-
ry fan for afters.
I chose sushi because it shows
a lot of skill, says Sinead, who
plans to go on to study catering
at South Essex College.
This is the first time Ive used
Fairtrade ingredients, but its
good because you know where
they come from.
Jody, who is moving on to col-
lege to study level three manage-
ment, agrees with ethical foods.
We have learnt about Fair-
trade in catering class, she says.
I havent used these ingredi-
ents before, but they are better
for the people making them.
In the end, Beauchamps High
School student, Josh Parry, 15,
emerged victorious, impressing
with his spaghetti bolognese,
which he embellished with a
splash of peanut butter, and his
chocolate fondant.
I started cooking at home
when I was 12, he explains.
Im always planning meals
and I like experimenting and put-
ting my own twist on things.
Fairtrade ingredients are
important because they come
from good sources and help peo-
ple who are not as well off as we
are.
As well as the annual cook-offs,
the Basildon Fairtrade group
holds regular stalls and cam-
paigns at Eastgate shopping cen-
tre, handing out stickers
and collecting signa-
tures for a petition
to lobby the Gov-
ernment to put
more pressure
on supermar-
kets to trade
more fairly.
Bananas are
currently the
highest- profile
yardstick by which
we judge working
conditions and rea-
sonable business practices.
This is, in part, down to their
popularity. In the UKlast year we
munched through five billion
bananas and spent 550million
on them.
Its big business. In fact,
bananas are the fourth most
tradable food commodity behind
rice, wheat and maize.
But a price war means they are
being sold more cheaply than
By JAMES COX
james.cox@nqe.com
Spreading the word From left, Lisa Taylor (food tech subject
leader at the James Hornsby School, Laindon), Sue Acton
(special events staff at Beauchamps High School, in Wickford),
Linda Williams (chair of Basildon Fairtrade group) and Aoife
Kilbane (food tech teacher at De La Salle School, in Basildon)
If you
are getting
a really
good deal in the
supermarket, the
chances are
someone is
suffering

Do you buy Fairtrade

ingredients when you go
shopping? If not, why not?
Cherrie Ager, Basildon:
When I can afford to I opt for
Fairtrade. Because thats
fair!
Peta Jessemey,
Colchester: Yes, if the
products are the same price
I will choose Fairtrade.
Tracy Worsley-Farnell,
Colchester: No, because
they are usually more
expensive.
Andrew Burgess, Basildon:
Price, price, price...we are
pushed to eat healthier, but
with the extortionate prices
the hyped-up markets
charge. I dont like the
power they have. But as
much as I moan, I, as a
consumer, have no choice to
purchase from
supermarkets, because
where else can I go to buy
my groceries?
Alan Robbo, Rochford: No,
I buy what I can afford.
Linda Williams, leader of
Basildons Fairtrade group,
says: A lot of people are
put off by the idea that
Fairtrade is more expensive.
In a lot of cases, they are
comparable. I have seen a
multipack of Fairtrade
bananas in Lidl which are
the same price as standard
fruit in Asda, for example.
There are cases where it
costs more. Olive oil is a lot
more expensive.
But then you have to
consider, why is that? Who
is losing out on the other
end when you buy cheap?
Your views
on Facebook
taste
A fair deal?
A banana
plantation
worker
Echo Thursday March 6, 2014 24 echo-news.co.uk