It may not seem that buying Fair Trade products, whose ingredients by definition come from the southern hemisphere, is helping in the fight against climate change. Indeed it may appear to make the problem worse, given the miles travelled. But that’s not the whole story! How goods travel makes a difference to their carbon footprint. Plus the energy needed to grow food locally can be much greater than for products grown in natural hot climates.

The FAIRTRADE Mark criteria and Fair Trade Principles include a strong emphasis on environmental sustainability, such as using natural fertilizers and inter cropping, and exclude the use of most pesticides. And the social premium paid over and above the fair price, is being used by co-operatives to mitigate against the impacts of climate change, which are most severely felt by farmers in the global south, who have done least to cause the problem. Examples include water irrigation systems and training in growing drought resistant crops.

But the real issue is about sustainable livelihoods. If farmers don’t receive enough to earn a decent living from growing crops like cocoa, coffee & bananas, then they will stop growing them and we won’t have the pleasure of enjoying them in the future.