Fighting the Banana Wars and Other Fairtrade Battles

by Harriet Lamb

It started very small and full of hope. But its daring campaigns have placed Fairtrade goods at the heart of the supermarket shelves. From bananas and coffee beans to cotton and chocolate, Fairtrade has grown to become an important global movement that has revolutionised the way we shop.

As Harriet Lamb, Director of the Fairtrade Foundation, explains in this fascinating story, Fairtrade is about a better deal for workers and famers in the developing world. It's about making sure the food on our plates, and shirts on our backs, don't rob people in other countries of the means to feed or clothe themselves. She explores the journey, through an often unjust system, that Fairtrade items make from farm to consumer. And she uncovers the shocking cost of our demand for cheaper food.

There is much still to be done. But by hard work and high ideals, Fairtrade is starting to transform the lives of over 7 million farmers, workers and their families, and is a powerful symbol of how extraordinary change can be achieved against all the odds - by us all.

Genres: Nonfiction, Food, Economics, Politics, Sustainability

256 pages, Paperback

First published February 7, 2008

Reviews

[Clare O'Beara · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book is crying out to carry photos, but doesn't. I found it a good insider's look at the process of Fair Trade certification, why it matters to farmers to work in a co-operative and cut out middlemen, why as little as buying their own co-op weighing scales makes a difference. No doubt that the standards have to be set and enforced, so farmers don't buy in extra coffee beans and pass them off as their own, or supermarkets can't decide not to pay a premium this month. The origins in Switzerland and the Netherlands are explained.

Now, there's a lot not contained in the book, which I would like to know. Some folks call that nosey. Well, how about the salary and pensions of all the Fairtrade workers and executives and so on; how about the relative cost to a farmer of getting certification and whether it's paid every year. Whether the EU regulations about overly bent bananas, too-small mangoes and blemished apples have cut into their trade or they have found ways to cope. While author Harriet rather annoyingly laments the many certifications and standards springing up - the book is published on paper which is Greenpeace approved for the Forestry Stewardship Council by the way - she gives not one mention to the Rainforest Alliance mark, what it does, how it varies from Fairtrade. No, she just tells us to buy Fairtrade.

Which, of course, I do, like many of us. Coffee is good if it's Fairtrade or Rainforest Alliance. I look for those marks on other foods too. I don't buy cut flowers from anywhere, so having them flown in from Ghana isn't a Fairtrade service I need. I'd really like to see a carbon footprint and airmiles stamped on all products. I also read all labels, so I know that cheap palm fats, not mentioned in the book, are taking over food products and dropping the price of dairy and home-grown fats and oils in place of wholesale rainforest destruction and native dweller clearances. I don't buy palm fats and I complain to firms and supermarkets about their use. But Harriet is more concerned to tell us about the abysmal standards for workers mining gold, something that most of us don't actually need (though it is used in industry). We might buy gold a few times in our lives; we buy food every few days.

I noticed that a large percentage of the references are from reports by Fairtrade or Oxfam, which is committed to Fairtrade. This just tells me that we should look for other slants on the topic. The personal stories are great, of course, villages, farmers, girls going to school. But Harriet cites an angry farmer in a developing nation as the reason why Fairtrade won't work with farmers in UK and Ireland. Yes, he says that developed nations subsidise farmers, and so they should; we need food security, local food and crafts, efficiency, low carbon emissions, high standards of animal care, environmental care and disease control. But farmers get paid very little from supermarkets, sometimes not enough to cover costs, while slightly bent carrots are rejected. I know of three farmers who had to club together to buy a harvester costing a million euro, then needing to run it day and night during harvest.

Overall it's an interesting and slightly scattered book which should encourage you to buy Fairtrade products a little more. A step in the right direction of paying producers, not the rich shareholders and directors.

[Tom Williams · Rating 3 out of 5]

A friend loaned me this book as he is committed to FairTrade and, knowing I was sceptical, wanted me to learn more about it. I was disappointed. Harriet Lamb is obviously writing from a very partisan viewpoint, which is fair enough, but her total belief in what she is doing means that she never seems to feel it necessary to advance arguments for her approach but simply to assert that it is right. I was reading this in the week when it emerged that Tesco was taking on young people to work in their stores without payment, yet Ms Lamb takes it as a given that exploitation in the commercial food chain starts and ends in the Third World. Growers and pickers must (quite rightly) be properly paid but after that, FairTrade doesn't really seem to care. Supermarkets can display the symbol on their own-brand goods even if their shelf-stackers aren't paid at all. Ms Lamb points out that farmers in the UK may be squeezed but they aren't starving, which is literally true but then many of the charming Third World farmers who pop up throughout the book with convenient sound bites praising FairTrade aren't starving either. They have it hard - but so do many UK farmers. Almost one UK farmer commits suicide every week (Malmberg, A., Hawton, K., Simkin, S. (1997) A study of suicide in farmers in England and Wales. Journal of Psychosomatic Research, 43, 107-111). Levels of infant mortality in some parts of the USA are greater than in India, but FairTrade buys products in India and, on principle, won't operate in the USA. I'm not saying that their decisions are unfair or unreasonable but they need explaining and defending with clear argument, not the mix of ex-colonial condescension and smug self-righteousness that quite often slips through here. Whether she is busily cycling from meeting to meeting or making passing reference to her Christian faith, Ms Lamb can come over as a bit of an insufferable goody two-shoes.

Harriet Lamb does rather have her organic cake and eat it. She cites her environmental credentials (and that bloody bike comes out again) but she is constantly jetting off around the world to meet a farmer here or attend a conference there. Her contribution to carbon levels must be quite significant - as is that of her products. Importing our vegetables from Nigeria might be good for Nigerian farmers, but it's hardly good for the planet. Ms Lamb assures us that most of the products are shipped by sea (though many - like fresh flowers - clearly aren't) quietly ignoring the fact that cargo vessels are themselves significant sources of carbon. Although ships generate less carbon per kilo of goods shipped, they currently account for around 4% of global carbon emissions - twice the total emissions of aircraft.

I'm being grossly unfair, of course. The idea that people in the Third World should be properly paid for their produce is absolutely right, and FairTrade has done a lot to help with this. But things are not as one-sided and straightforward as they might appear from reading this book. Much is made of FairTrade bananas. A FairTrade banana is a FairTrade banana - it's pretty straightforward. Much less is said about FairTrade chocolate. Global supply issues mean that the cocoa in your FairTrade chocolate bar might be fairly traded or it might not. International commodity markets aren't that simple and this book does not address their complexities. There are passing references to how the definition of FairTrade varies from product to product and is the result of negotiation with buyers, but no details are provided. And details matter.

In the same way, the book supports some of its more significant statements with footnotes. But if you check out these footnotes (and I'm an obsessive footnote checker) you'll see that they are often to secondary sources. Many of these secondary sources are Oxfam publications. Oxfam is committed to FairTrade. So arguments in a book which is essentially a bit of old-fashioned agitprop for FairTrade are being supported by reference to other books which are themselves propaganda for the system.

If you believe that FairTrade is great and want to pat yourself on the back, this is the book for you. If you know nothing about what is an important scheme to make international trade in agriculture fairer to poor producers, this might be a useful introduction. But if you want an informed and critical analysis of how FairTrade works, what the problems are with it and how it might be developed, this book is a complete waste of your time.

[Ajay · Rating 1 out of 5]

This book is a waste of time. Rather than focusing on the battles that Fairtrade has fought and telling an interesting story about them, this book is just marketing for Fairtrade, written poorly by a Fairtrade executive.

There is also a lot missing from this book. The salaries and pensions of Fairtrade executives. The cost of certification for farmers. The relative efficiency of banana production among Fairtrade producers exclusive of the labour cost. How does Fairtrade compare to the Rainforest Alliance?

Would pass.

[Steve Flig · Rating 4 out of 5]

OK, so this is an anecdotal book by someone with an important role and excellent vantage point within the recent Fair Trade movement. It is not an academic or fundamentally analytical work. As long as you bear that in mind, this is a good book, well written and with loads of useful information.

** I wrote this review on 11 June 2012 and am copying it here because GR won't give me access to my original account **

[Gemma Williams · Rating 4 out of 5]

A very good and informative book about the history, principles and effects of the fairtrade movement, by an author who is obviously passionate about her subject. Brings vividly to life the impact, positive and negative, of our consumption on others. It will certainly change by habits from just buying fairtrade when I see it as an option, to actively seeking it out. A recommended read to remind us we are not completely powerless when we can act in solidarity with others.

[Ollie · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book had some great personal stories about how what we buy in our supermarkets effects the different people in the supply chains producing our bananas, coffee, cotton and more. If you want to know more about Fair Trade this is a great place to start with the final chapter providing tips on what we can do as consumers to help Fair trades growth.

[Steve · Rating 4 out of 5]

OK so this is an anecdotal book by someone with an important role and excellent vantage point within the recent Fair Trade movement. It is not an academic or fundamentally analytical work. As long as you bear that in mind, this is a good book, well written and with loads of useful information.

[Steve · Rating 3 out of 5]

The first half was interesting but I found the second half very "samey" with not much new added.

[astried]

have read the sample n was quite taken by it

[Elma Jenkins]

A great book by an inspiring women who has made many influential lists that examins trade gone wrong, simple

[Zaahid Asvat]

This I read just after my Fair trade topic and every class we would talk about a new Fairtrade item and this book on bananas can encourage you so badly you will never forget to buy the banans

[Kateřina Gazdová · Rating 4 out of 5]

You should read this!