Last month the Fairtrade Foundation celebrated the fifteenth anniversary of the first Fairtrade products with a party hosted by Sarah Brown at 10 Downing Street. At the same time the government announced a huge investment of £12 million for Fairtrade. This will benefit in particular food producers, whose products are identified by the Fairtrade mark, and the aim is to double the number of producers and treble Fairtrade sales worldwide to $10 billion Euros by 2014.

A TNS research of 25,000 households showed that despite the tough economic climate, consumers are spending more on Fairtrade products than ever before. Sales rose by 43% last year and are expected to rise at least as much again in 2009.

“Fair Trade is booming,” said Jeremy Piercy of Shared Earth, the UK’s largest Fair Trade gift retailer. “It’s not just food – retailers selling Fair Trade gifts are doing well too. At Shared Earth we started the year worried about the recession, but in the last two months we have opened two new shops in Brighton and Canterbury, and both are doing well. Fair trade is becoming part of the mainstream and retailers who don’t take notice will be missing out.”

In addition to its ten shops, Shared Earth wholesales Fair Trade products from 15 countries. It is particularly concerned about how climate change will increase world poverty, and specialises in developing products made from sustainable materials.

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