MAKING THE DIFFERENCE
A new global strategy for Fairtrade
Fairtrade Labelling’s
Strategic Review (2007/2008)
CONTENTS
1. / Introduction by Barbara Fiorito, Chair of FLO, during the period of the strategic review / 32. / The Plan At A Glance / 4
3. / Revalidating Our Beliefs – Fairtrade’s Mission, Vision & Values / 5
4. /
The Scope of Fairtrade
/ 65. /
Our Ambitions for Fairtrade
/ 86. / Changing the way we work / 10
7. / What these changes mean for our stakeholders / 14
8. / Ideas Into Action: Our Programme For Change / 15
9. / Next Steps in the Strategic Review / 16
10. / Looking Back: Context & Process of our Strategic Review: / 16
11. / Acknowledgement & Thanks / 17
1. Introduction by Barbara Fiorito, Chair of FLO (during period of strategic review)
There is a much-repeated story, originating in the work of the American ecologist and poet Loren Eisley, about two people on a beach, one of whom is frantically picking up starfish stranded by the retreating tide. The other pleads with them to stop wasting time and energy, saying “there are just too many, you can’t make a difference”, to which the first one responds as another starfish is returned to the sea “well I made a difference to that one!”
It’s a fitting parable for the Fair Trade movement which has always been driven more by the desire to make a practical difference to the lives of people where we can, than by a need to conceptualise generic solutions to the problems of trade and development. It’s an approach that has served us well in the past. In the last seven years alone, global sales of Fairtrade certified products have increased nearly ten-fold to almost 2.4 billion Euros annually. In this period, Fairtrade has expanded from a small range of basic commodities to a truly lifestyle option for consumers in our most successful markets that today benefits over 1.5 million farmers, workers and their families.
It’s also an approach that we should maintain for the future. One of the things that makes Fairtrade special is the way it harnesses the passion and commitment of so many people with diverse talents and perspectives in order to make a difference. Never has that been more apparent than in the Strategic Review process that is currently drawing to a close and on which we report in this paper. Over the course of nearly two years, the members and stakeholders of Fairtrade have engaged in extensive discussion about how we can best realise our shared mission and vision in the next phase of our work. In particular, the voice of our producer partners has been heard more clearly than ever before, and has influenced the largest part of our emerging strategy.
But our Strategic Review, while reminding us of our shared goals and reinforcing our strengths as a global network, has also required us to look at where we can improve the impact of our work and how we should do things differently in the future. We live in a changing world in which new issues such as climate change are rising rapidly up the agenda of our stakeholders and the general public. If we are to retain and build on public support we must be more dynamic and adaptable to that external environment, but we must also remain constant in our fight against poverty and injustice which continue to afflict so many of our fellow citizens. We can do both if we have clarity and agreement on our long-term goals and hold fast to our unchanging beliefs and values.
As Chair of the FLO Board I am immensely grateful to all of those who have worked so hard to make the Strategic Review a success; not only in terms of its concrete outputs but also in the way the project has been conducted. It has shown Fairtrade at its best. The conclusion of this project also marks the end of my tenure as Chair and I am delighted that I hand to my successor such a strong beacon to light the way for the next stage of Fairtrade’s journey.
Barbara Fiorito, former Chair of FLO
2. The Plan At A Glance
· Fairtrade’s vision is of a world in which all producers can enjoy secure and sustainable livelihoods, fulfil their potential and decide on their future.
· Our mission is to connect consumers and producers via a label which promotes fairer trading conditions and through which people who are disadvantaged by conventional trade[1] can combat poverty, strengthen their position and take more control over their lives
· We aim to be a social enterprise in which consumers and producers are social as well as economic players, and a global movement for change, deriving our authority from our connections with all levels of civil society, which will be reflected in our ownership and governance structures.
· The growth of Fairtrade in recent years means that we can now make a step change in the impact of our work but we must do so in a way that genuinely creates and sustains change in the way trade is conducted. We need to broaden, deepen and strengthen our operations so that we scale up in a way that is true to our core beliefs. Accordingly we will -
Enable change for producers through an operating model that prioritises Fairtrade’s role of enabling development via producer empowerment rather than simply a policing activity. We will be accountable to consumers for the promise that every purchase supports the efforts of producers to work towards a socially and environmentally sustainable livelihood, rather than a guarantee of “perfection” in ethical issues.
Revise our standards and certification systems to ensure they are aligned with the empowerment and development goals of Fairtrade, and can adapt to the needs of individual producers rather than imposing a model on them.
Make producer support a more integral part of the Fairtrade system and devolve operations to the South so that they are more responsive to the needs of producers and more accountable to them.
Support the Producer Networks in their desire to have a clearer role and take on greater responsibility within the Fairtrade system.
Re-organise our market-facing operations so that we operate more as a single global system and can better leverage fundamental change in business commitment and adoption of Fairtrade principles.
Develop Fairtrade’s capacity to support marginalized producers and their communities by further increasing consumer demand for Fairtrade in mainstream consumer markets.
Extend the scope of Fairtrade to new product areas in a carefully-managed way that ensures we are not growing one part of the market at the expense of another and that considers development impact, reputational risk and the best use of resources.
Manage and deliver change from the centre by reorganising and strengthening our core activities and working more strategically within product categories and in producer countries and regions.
The proposed changes to the way we work will be implemented through a two-year transformation programme that will equip Fairtrade with the organisational structure, working culture and resources to ensure it is fit for purpose at the scale we aspire to. We seek to make Fairtrade more credible, affordable, simple, efficient scaleable and we will develop indicators that measure our performance against these criteria.
Implementation of the strategy will follow approval of the plan by FLO’s General Assembly (expected December 2008) but we hope that the dialogues that have begun in the course of our Strategic Review will continue. We believe the strategy is stronger for having been developed collaboratively and we intend to build on that process in the way we deliver our agreed objectives.
3. Revalidating Our Beliefs: Fairtrade’s Mission, Vision & Values
Fairtrade’s vision is of a world in which all producers can enjoy secure and sustainable livelihoods, fulfil their potential and decide on their future. We believe that trade can be a fundamental driver of poverty reduction and greater sustainable development, but only if it is managed for that purpose, with greater equity and transparency than is currently the norm. We believe that people can overcome disadvantage and marginalisation if they are empowered to take more control over their work and their lives, if they are better organised, resourced and supported, and can secure access to mainstream markets under fair trading conditions.
We also believe that people, businesses and civil society institutions in the developed world are supportive of trading in this way when they understand the needs of producers and the opportunities that Fairtrade offers to change and improve their situation. Our work is driven by informed consumer choices, and the desire of business to meet the expectations of their customers, both of which provide crucial support for wider campaigning to reform international trade rules and create a fairer economic system.
Our mission therefore is to connect consumers and producers via a label which promotes fairer trading conditions through which producers who are disadvantaged by conventional trade can combat poverty, strengthen their position and take more control over their lives
Our vision and mission will be reflected in the values by which we work as an organisation so that we ourselves set an example for the changes we seek in others. Therefore we will work collaboratively and seek to empower those who wish to be partners in our mission. Trust is a crucial factor in our work and we will be mindful of our responsibilities to those who place their trust in us, embracing transparency and stakeholder participation as important ways of being accountable for our work.
4. The Scope of Fairtrade
In order to maintain focus on our core mission and to maximise the impact of our work, we have agreed the scope within which Fairtrade will operate as follows.
People
· The needs of small-scale producers for market access under fair trading conditions lies at the heart of Fairtrade and will continue to be a priority. No other ethical trade initiative addresses the problems faced by family-based producers working at the far end of global supply chains over which they have virtually no influence, but in which decisions are made that can affect their whole lives. Without Fairtrade in the past twenty years, the numbers of those forced off their land and into migrant labour or urban poverty would have been swelled by hundreds of thousands more farming families.
· After decades in which smallholders have been squeezed out of markets by larger plantations the world is beginning to wake up to the damage this has caused socially and environmentally. Fairtrade has shown that small-scale farmers can achieve greater productivity while preserving the natural environment and the wellbeing of people working on the land, as well as delivering high quality products. We will do more to help small producer organisations demonstrate a truly sustainable model of production and trade. Our unique focus on empowering small-scale producers through democratic, farmer-owned organisations will therefore be maintained and developed.
· But Fairtrade has a wider ambition to assist all people who are disadvantaged by conventional trade, and landless labourers are among those in greatest need of our model. We have worked with plantations employing workers in products like tea and bananas for most of our history and in recent years this aspect of our work has also brought benefits to growers of grapes, citrus and flowers. We will strengthen our hired labour model to ensure that it complements the work of others seeking to secure and enhance labour rights in the Global South. In particular we shall develop a stronger partnership with independent trade unions that are the best means by which workers can be empowered to negotiate on a more equal footing with their employers.
· Our plans also present opportunities to extend the reach of Fairtrade to more areas of production, and we shall seek to open the system to different kinds of producer set-ups that could use Fairtrade for development and empowerment. We shall also review our work across supply chains, looking for more opportunities in the products we certify for value to be added in the developing world, and to bring people working in these later stages of production into Fairtrade.
· We will improve our understanding of the particular contexts in which different groups of people experience hardship. This will include strengthening our policies on equality and diversity within organisations in respect of issues such as gender and ethnicity as well as the contexts of people as economic actors such as farmers or workers. We will ensure that we provide the most appropriate support for each, and that we do not support one group at the expense of another. We will also develop tools to assist small producer organisations to retain access to Fairtrade markets in which suppliers of different scale and capacity operate.
Products
· Fairtrade’s origins lie in agricultural products and will continue to be a major focus of our work. Global trade in agriculture is inherently unfair and the failure of the WTO’s Doha (“Development”) Round of trade negotiations to change this adds impetus to our work. Moreover, improved access to rich country markets for the developing world’s farmers and farm-workers is recognised as an important route out of poverty.
· The vibrant and dynamic market for Fairtrade products that exists in many countries has also benefited producers of the original products included in Fairtrade such as coffee and bananas. There are many producers who are currently outside the Fairtrade system and who are eager for us to extend the scope of standards and certification. Accordingly we will invest more in extending Fairtrade to all sectors of agricultural production and trade where we can have impact, and we will also streamline the processes by which this happens.