BULLET POINTS

National Campaigner Committee meeting -17th June 2014.

  • 2014 is the 20th anniversary of the Fairtrade Mark and there is going to be a celebratory event in London in October to recognise this important milestone. There will, as a result, be no National Supporter Conference this year.
  • Seven of the twelve NCC regions will be holding Regional Supporter Conferences in the next few months – details of the East England Regional Supporter Conference on 18th October 2014can be found here - Please do sign up – all welcome.
  • Campaigners are welcome to attend any of theregional supporter conferences.
  • Consumer research has now been conducted in the UK to understand better how consumers will react to Fairtrade Sourcing Partnerships. While this showed that the proposed new label was clearly understood, the NCC is not yet aware of whether or when front-of-pack labelling will be launched in the UK.
  • The NCC was asked to provide feedback regarding several options for the focus of campaigning in 2015.
  • The NCC discussed the recent report issued by SOAS, University of London which has produced some criticism of Fairtrade in the media. Useful responses can be found here: Harriet Lamb, Centre for Golbal Development, Natural Resources Institute, Simon Maxwell, ISEAL Alliance, and Ed Mayo.
  • Communication with campaigners was discussed. The NCC is aware that not all supporters are necessarily on Fairtrade Foundation’s email lists. To ensure you are fully up-to-date with Fairtrade news for towns, faith groups, schools and all campaigns please sign up here -
  • Everyone was inspired by hearing Adam Brett, founder of Tropical Wholefoods, speak about his pioneering work with producers to supply Fairtrade fruits from Uganda, Burkina Faso, Pakistan and Afghanistan. Contact Rachel@fullwellmill for samples of products or to obtain information on local shops who stock Tropical Wholefoods products.
  • The nextInternational Fair Trade Towns conference will be held in Bristol on4th and 5th July 2015. The theme will be Fair Trade for Sustainability – see Do contact Jenny Foster at for more details.
  • The Fairtrade Foundation is developing a new website which is starting to go live over the next few weeks. They are also working on creating a vastly improved database for campaigning and maintaining contact with campaigners and supporters.