How could the dinner you cook tonight or the birthday gift you purchase help a small village in Africa, Asia, or Latin America? If they are fair trade products, they've been produced sustainably, under safe working conditions, at a fair price, and recognizing high labor and gender equity standards. It's easy to overlook the growing amount of fair trade products available at local stores. Sometimes these ambiguous products easily blend in on the shelf with their competition. If you're lucky, you may find that they have their own section. Look for the Fairtrade label. The fair trade movement has taken firm root in Europe, and is now only beginning to get seeded in the United States.
Pennsylvania is home to the first fair trade town in the United States: Welcome to Media, Pennsylvania in this podcast. A Philadelphia suburb, this forward-thinking community worked together to take all the necessary steps to be recognized as a Fair Trade town: they have a certain number of businesses that are committed to selling fair trade products, another set committed to using those products, a committee of citizens in place to stay up to speed on fair trade issues, they've instituted public relations around their status, and the local electorate has passed resolutions supporting the effort. And as if that wasn't inspiration enough, Media is also wholly committed to using renewable energy; many businesses (and residents) purchase green energy, and there are programs in place to use solar energy on all of the municipal facilities (and then some!)
Join PennFuture's Joy Bergey as she explores Media, learning more about how this small town in Pennsylvania is affecting small towns all over the world-- and how the Fair Trade movement fits hand in glove with their other efforts to buy local, use green energy, and reduce their carbon footprint.
Learn more about the various individuals, businesses, and organizations Joy meets in this podcast. Many are endorsers of PennFuture's Cool Pennsylvania campaign, aimed at stopping global warming right here at home:
Elizabeth Killough: Untours Foundation (formerly Idyll Foundation)
Hal Taussig, Brian Lux-Taussig, and Kim Paschen: Untours, Ltd.
Ira Jospehs: Selene Whole Foods Co-Op
Drew Arata: Earth and State Gallery
Tom Hibberd: Rotary Club of Media
Rena Shaffer: Ten Thousand Villages
