Ethical Markets: Growing the Green Economy

Today, I watched an episode entitled "Fair Trade, Ethical Trading" from the American TV series Ethical Markets: Growing the Green Economy (2007) created by Hazel Henderson. My dad lives in the only Green political riding in Canada, and it left me – post-election – feeling a desire to celebrate Green. But I walked away from this 28 minute program, feeling thoughtful. The pacing was like most TV documentaries, which is frustrating enough, but I was more confused by some of the values that surfaced.


Assuming Western Values
They interviewed Bob Stiller, president and founder of Green Mountain Coffee Roasters, whose company has worked hard to develop a branch of fair trade coffee (about 20% of their line). He talked of his shock in discovering that the farmers’ children could only attend school up to the 2nd grade before they had to join the ranks of the farm.

A little trade here and presto, the children have now graduated from high school and some have even gone on to University. What this makes me think about is how we’ve imposed the Western value that children should be in school and school is in the classroom, but how it disregards the learning that may take place in these communities on the farm. I feel it’s very important that we are careful that fair trade does not equate to supporting only industries abroad that side with Western values. This is the parental idea that "we know best, you should do as we say" when it is in reality "we have more power, because of our monitory presence on and the way we've set up the global economy."

I think it is important to note that I find this a challenging issue, ethically, when were talking about human rights, such as in the argument around genital mutilation. Here stands a so-called "cultural practice" for which I have no tolerance for, but regret to impose my own Western values upon.


That Native Ways are Sustainable Ways?
They also interviewed Chris Mann, CEO of Guayaki, who works with the production of Yerba Maté green tea in Paraguay’s rain forest. I felt a little sceptical when he finished off by saying “we use native wisdom in terms of how they processed it in the past...” and the underlying assumption that because the people native to a place have always done it in such a way that it will be environmentally sustainable. I’m certainly not denying a deep, rich culture that can be passed down through generations and provide abundant knowledge, but I’m pointing out that the ways of our ancestors may not have been necessarily more environmentally sustainable than the current ones.

I am cautions when I see branding that says “traditionally made” or “going back to the way things were” because, (1) the environmental impacts have intensified since then and we probably have to redouble our efforts at environmental sustainability and pollution reduction and (2) how did we get here in the first place if things were so much better at this mystical unknown time that the brands allude to.



Global Exchange

They also briefly presented this organization and it sounded pretty interesting from what I understood. I haven't looked very closely at the website, but it looks like a pretty decent source of information on Fair trade from the social and environmental points of view.
See it here: http://www.globalexchange.org/


Thank you again to the Toronto Public Library for the DVD loan