Fair Trade Products and Living Green
April 22, 2008 by GMOShirt
Filed under Fair Trade
Fair Trade products are a very important part of Living Green as a responsible servant of the earth and its people. The following is an email I received from
Rubana Ahmad owner of Ethika Boutique Ltd. In response to my need to understand why Fair Trade is an important part of the Living Green issue.
Hello Living Green,
Sure I’m happy to help.
For me Fair Trade is being able to receive a just pay that enables workers to earn enough to eat and provide for their families and invest in their futures. Fair Trade is the new fight for equality in human rights for those that work in the third world. Our female embroiderers were formerly cleaners, sweeping floors every morning, after a whole month earning a mere £4, which is simply nothing!!! Yet they had no choice but to take this demoralizing work. We enable them to use their inherited skills and are happy for them to work from their homes, in a safe environment, and we pay them what they ask, we do not bring the price down at all. They regularly ask our managers for more work.
I think Fair Trade goes hand in hand with Living green. The two co-exist with each other, and we all value our environment so we try our best to use low-impact dyes that aren’t harmful to workers or the environment. I think it’s up to us the consumers to make this change, and be aware that the mass produced cheap clothes that large companies market are coming at a steep price to many people who are being exploited.
I have just this week answered another company’s question, and I thought it might be interesting for you to have a look,
Dear Rubana,
My name is Freia and I’m writing an article about the ‘true cost of cheap fashion’ for Chris from fair-trade boutique’s website. I was wandering whether I could ask you some questions to add into my report and get opinions of people who are connected to fair-trade boutique. It would really help in developing ideas within this subject area.
Why do you think this whole cheap fast fashion has taken off? An interesting co-incidence to note is that cheap culture took off about the same time, that easy jet revolutionized air travel through cheap tickets; so many consumers became spoilt by naturally expecting a bargain in other areas too. Also with easy jet, there isn’t direct exploitation of people, but yes the environment bears a steep price. People also spend a lot more than they save, and the steep deadly rise in house prices are also a big, big influencing factor, there is just a lot less money to go around. I’ve also noticed that students particularly like to keep a certain image, and like to update their wardrobe frequently. Perhaps this habit trickles through their lives and with a higher income, the more they can purchase. There are also many poor communities that actually live on the edge and just can’t afford to spend more than £10 or £20 per month. They have to buy there clothing from somewhere. The clothes shop they use to visit were pretty dismal, but huge clothing shops like Marks and Spencer have rebranded themselves, as well as Matalan among others to make cheap clothing affordable and great looking, so of course we all think, if it looks just as good, why should we pay more?
Perhaps consumers made the jump, and thought why not cheap clothing, no-ones loosing out, and we can buy more clothes and affordably keep our images up to date. I actually went to a radio interview where the host exclaimed proudly, this cardigan was from Matalan for £7, but then I asked, how is it that it can be offered for such a cheap price??? There must be someone who is being exploited and paid almost nothing for you to get this price.
I was disgusted when I started to read some articles from The Ecologist from Dame Anita Roddicks article that children, women and men were being made to work around the clock in Bangladesh and working incredibly long hours with no breaks, and perhaps they earn a mere pittance that they can hardly survive on let alone build a normal standard of life on. Why shouldn’t they have the same rights as we do, for a minimum wage, and for decent rights of breaks and some type of medical coverage and educational fees for the families’ children? I read further about their awful situations and the lack of choices for any other type of job apart from cleaning which pays the same, they don’t have money to study for qualifications, and the countries in Asia lack the infrastructure and growth to offer good jobs. These very sweat shops supply many of the cheap chains. I decided then and there not to purchase these items.
Is the problems associated with this fast cheap fashion influenced your choice of area within fashion?
Of course, I new many women through family contacts who were themselves educated through people’s donations, but lacked any opportunities to work. I realized that they have a huge wealth of skills that I could market to make a really exclusive brand; I just needed to DO IT. And you can see what they can achieve by viewing the Ethika Boutique collection.
Do you think this unethical production of products will pass as the public get more aware of issues to do with this?
I certainly think consumers are more willing to consider buying an ethically sourced garment, that they know every effort has been taken to avoid exploitation. I think the more our society is educated the more valuable they will think an ethical purchase is.
Does it make you more aware of these issues when buying products yourself do you only buy fair-trade?
I am certainly aware of these issues, and do try to by my clothing from shops that I now give back and support fair-trade.
Thanks for listening,
best regards,
Rubana Ahmad.
Ethika Boutique Ltd
www.ethikaboutique.com
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