By Fair Trade Certified™
Celebrate Fair Trade Month by joining our Fair Trade community!
Improving lives and protecting the planet. That's what the Fair Trade Certified™ community is all about. It started, as you might guess, with coffee.
Prior to pioneering the Fair Trade movement, Paul Rice, our founder, spent 11 years in the Nicaraguan highlands working directly with coffee farmers, many of them living on less than $2 per day.
While there, he came to a profound realization — people living in poverty don't want handouts, they just want fair pay for an honest day’s work. These farmers are more than capable of solving their own problems, if only global coffee markets could provide (instead of systemically denying) them the necessary resources. That realization was the seed that grew to be Fair Trade Certified.
And consumers responded! People like you banded together and agreed that coffee farmers should have a decent shot at improving their lives and communities. Over the years, we’ve dramatically expanded our fair trade system to benefit coffee farmers and many more: workers and farmers of produce, tea, cocoa, cotton, sugarcane, and more; fishers; and factory workers, all of whom are now able to make significant improvements in their lives, their communities, and the environments around them.
To date, our fair trade system has delivered an additional $1 billion (and counting) back to those farmers, fishers, and factory workers, all thanks to the purchases of folks like you — who understand in the broad impact of the Fair Trade Certified seal.
Join us in our collective effort to make global trade work for us AND the communities who produce our essential goods.
It's Fair Trade Month — here's why that matters
Fair Trade Month honors and celebrates the rich history and promising future of the fair trade movement in all its forms.
Fair trade is so much more than a movement. It’s an ambitious vision for change, the idea that lives can be improved by empowering people to control their own destiny, with the resources they earn, in the communities they love. As our fair trade movement grows, this vision for change comes to life.
Since 1998, we’ve expanded Fair Trade Certified products from coffee to tea, fruits and veggies, apparel, seafood, furniture and more – and as new products become certified, more producers benefit, and we create more positive change together.
Why join our Fair Trade Community?
Community
Become part of an enthusiastic community of Fair Trade consumers & advocates
Learning
Learn how you can make individual impact toward solving environmental, social, and economic problems on a global scale
Exclusives
Get access to Fair Trade Community exclusive deals, events, gift guides, and promotions from us and the brands you love — like Patagonia, Guittard chocolate, Equator Coffees, Tazo Tea, Kroger, and more
Impact
Understand the impact of the dollars you spend on Fair Trade Certified products
“I enjoy being on the Fair Trade Committee. My fellow workers share their ideas with me on how we can implement premiums to help the community. I have received 4 years of Fair Trade premiums and every time, I’m proud to have been part of the program. The first year when we received the premium, I purchased a bicycle for my son, Kaushik Das. I never thought I would buy a bicycle before I had the extra funds from the premium. Since then, I’ve put my premiums into savings for the future, which is what a lot of the workers favor – helping themselves in the long term.”
— Deepali Das, Fair Trade Committee member & factory worker, Kalkota, West Bengal
About Fair Trade Certified
We are building an innovative model of responsible business, conscious consumerism, and shared value to eliminate poverty and enable sustainable development for farmers, workers, their families, and their communities around the world.
Fair Trade USA™, a tax-exempt 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization, is the leading certifier of fair trade products in North America. Offering award-winning, rigorous, and globally recognized sustainable sourcing certification programs that improve livelihoods, protect the environment, and build resilient, transparent supply chains, its trusted Fair Trade Certified™ seal on a product signifies that it was made according to stringent fair trade standards. Fair Trade USA is building an innovative model of responsible business, conscious consumerism, and shared value to eliminate poverty and enable sustainable development for farmers, workers, their families, and communities around the world.
