Fairtrade Fortnight and the Big Swap in Hedge End

The Fairtrade Fortnight Big Swap is a national campaign running from 22 February to 7 March and here in Hedge End you can take part in a number of ways.

The Big Swap Fortnight has been organised to raise awareness of Fairtrade food, clothes, homeware, and health and beauty items. The idea is for people to ‘swap’ their normal brand of tea, chocolate, jam, wine, fruit, cereals, etc, for a Fairtrade product – see the Fairtrade Foundation website for a list of products available from Fairtrade.

The aim of Fairtrade is to ensure that producers in developing countries are paid a fair rate for their product, enabling them to provide their workers with a decent wage and to support community projects in areas such as healthcare, housing, sanitation and education.

A supporter of the Fairtrade in Eastleigh Borough Campaign, Hedge End’s D@rt Centre at Wildern School is promoting the fortnight in a number of ways.  There will be tea-tasting at the Centre’s Freetrade cafe during the next two weeks, from 3.30-9.00pm on weekdays and throughout the day at weekends and with customers given a free cup of tea of their choice.

On Thursday 25 February the school is hosting a Third World Trade Schools Conference to which local schools have been invited. Speakers will include representatives from Kool Skools, Rotary and the charity Oxfam, which is supporting Fairtrade Fortnight by ‘swapping’ a box of Fairtrade tea in return for every bag of quality donations. The nearest Oxfam shop to Hedge End is in Eastleigh, at 29 High Street, SO50 5LF.

The Hedge End Arts Appreciation Society in conjunction with One Community will be organising a tea-tasting event during the conference and will have on offer cakes made with fruit soaked in tea.

Wildern is in the process of applying to be awarded ‘Fairtrade School’ status. This requires the school to run events and raise awareness of the principles of fair trading which the school does through focus on issues surrounding third world trade in various lessons, including geography, cookery and dancing.

The Fairtrade Foundation reports that two billion people – one third of the population of the planet – live on less than $2 a day.

In the UK over 3,000 Fairtrade products are available with the Foundation stating that the UK market doubles in value every two years, with a figure of £493m quoted for 2007. More Fairtrade products are sold in the UK than anywhere, with for example 20 percent of roast and ground coffee sold and 20 percent of bananas now Fairtrade.

Sainsbury’s, Budgens, the Co-op and Tescos all stock Fairtrade products and support the Fairtrade Fortnight and Fairtrade products are identifiable through the logo they carry guaranteeing they meet Fairtrade standards.

If you make a ‘swap’ you’re asked to register it on the Fairtrade website. The Foundation is looking for one million and one swaps and at 4.30 on Tuesday 23 February 166,420 swaps had been made with 883,581 to go – but blink and the numbers change!

The Fairtrade Foundation was established in1992 by CAFOD, Christian Aid, Oxfam, Traidcraft and the World Development Movement.

The charity One Community provides voluntary sector support, community development, day care, domestic help, information and transport services in and around the borough of Eastleigh.