CR spoke with the Fairtrade Foundation

Sarah J: You also work alongside really big companies in trying to persuade them to extend their selling of fair trade goods as well don't you?

Barbara: We've always worked with the big supermarkets right from the very early days when we were out there banging on shop doors trying to get them to stock the very first fair trade product. We managed to get a few of those products into really big companies like Sainsbury and Tesco. Supermarkets like the Co-op and Sainsbury have gone on to expand quite a large range of fair trade products now; both the original 100% fair trade brands like Divine Chocolate and Café Direct, but also they've developed their own labels.

More recently we've seen some big switches, for example, Tate & Lyle have switched nearly all of their retail sugar. Ben & Jerry's have committed to using fair trade ingredients. Every ingredient that can be fair trade will be fair trade in all of their ice creams. By the end of this year every Ben & Jerry ice cream flavour will be fair trade and pretty much all of them are now; there's a few left to go.

Cadbury Dairy Milk and Dairy Milk buttons have gone fair trade. The four finger Kit-Kats both the milk and dark chocolate are now fair trade as well. So gradually the big companies have seen there's a growing demand; that people really want to play their part in giving farmers a better deal. Companies have started to wake up.

All Starbucks espresso based coffee, that's every latte and every cappuccino and every espresso, they're all fair trade now. That has been really good to see the big companies coming on board.

At the same time we still want people to go out and buy from some of those other brands that pioneered all those years ago. We don't want them to lose out. We're really keen that people still go out and buy Divine Chocolate and Café Direct tea and coffee and Equal Exchange and Tradecraft and all of those brands that worked so hard for 20 years to take fair trade where it is now.

Sarah J: Where do you think we are in the dilemma of wanting to shop ethically but thinking it's more expensive?

Barbara: There were good reasons why fair trade products were a little bit more expensive. Obviously we were paying the farmers a better price, but also a lot of the companies who were doing that were quite small companies. It is relatively more expensive to try and process and ship and export products in small quantities. The more we could build the sales, the more they could find those economies of scale and bring the prices down a little bit. It's much easier if you can shift a whole container of cocoa beans than if you have to buy a bit of space in somebody else's container. What we've seen is fair trade products are now priced very competitively.

Sarah J: What kind of opportunities does the Fairtrade Foundation offer for volunteers?

Barbara: Increasingly there's a massive movement out there. Fair trade wouldn't have got where it is today without the amazing work of people all over the UK. For example Stoke-on-Trent is a fair trade town. That means that there's been colleges and schools and I know a lot of the churches in Stoke-on-Trent have been involved and the Civic Centre has supported the campaign over the years. That's really amazing and that's part of a national movement. There are 520 fair trade towns across the UK and we've got 4,500 schools involved.

We have lots of volunteers working with us here in the office in London, so if anybody wants to volunteer in London for the Fairtrade Foundation, they can apply to do that on our website. In fact a lot of our campaigns and a lot of our work simply wouldn't be possible without all the amazing volunteers that we have. There are also so many opportunities to get involved with the local campaign; whether it's your school or your church or college or your work place; this is a real opportunity. That's what has made fair trade as well known today here in the UK as it is. We wouldn't have been able to do that without ordinary people saying, well I can't go and volunteer for a big organisation in their offices, what I can do is organise a little event here in my work place; or I can put something on in my church.

Fair trade isn't just about putting labels on products, it's about us trying to connect in a more meaningful way with the people who are growing the food or the cotton that's in our clothing.

I didn't mention before, but gold is the newest fair trade product working with small scale miners. There are so many opportunities to go out there and spread the word. Then in fair trade fortnight which is in February/March every year, we try and create opportunities that just an ordinary person could take action, or with a group of friends or family.

Sarah J: Tell me a bit more about the fair trade gold, because there are ways in which people can ethically shop for diamonds and now we're going to be able to actually purchase fair trade gold.