Misrelate

Walk around your nearest branch of Morrissons, and you’re observing the benefits of global market forces. One can buy practically any product at a very low price. It could be pineapples from Cambodia or tea from Chile - it’s for sale throughout the year. There’s never been a better period of time in human history to be a consumer! This has come about through just in time stock control, economies of scale, powerful competitive forces, and possibly most influentially, the fact that many goods are located, and frequently produced, in the poorest nations.

The final point is quite important, and contentious. While consumers are purchasing food, drink, clothing and other items made from the poorest nations at cheap cost, labourers and business organisations in these manufacturing countries are frequently cheated, and have no true sustainable business model as they’re the last stop of a very long line of middle men who order what they produce, how much, and how often. This extended chain of middle-men all take their share too - in the end there’s not much money for the end-of-line producer.

Nonetheless, there is help for such desperate labourers and businesses. Fairtrade is a movement which looks to empower these end-manufacturing businesses in the poorest nations of the world. It attempts to banish the middlemen, and pay the end-manufacturer a just price for a product in a far more targeted way. You may have encountered Fairtrade products in your local supermarket. You’ll sometimes find they’re a little bit more pricy, but by purchasing such ethical products or even ethical gifts, you will be happy to acknowledge the manufacturer is working in a sustainable business environment that not only pays them evenhandedly through much more direct revenue streams, but it also permits them to reinvest in their company through higher profits, which actually makes a difference to these poorest parts of the world.