Fairtrade Footballs at Total Sport in Jersey
As part of Fairtrade Fortnight, Island children are learning how playing games with ethically produced sports equipment can help to end child labour in the Third World.
On Monday 7 March, the young winners of football and netball competitions will be presented with Fairtrade balls supplied by The Co-operative. Making the presentation at La Moye School will be James Lloyd, the joint founder of Fairdeal Trading, an innovative ethical company that produces Fairtrade footballs and netballs. The FairDeal Trading Partnership works with non-governmental organisations to provide footballs to disadvantaged children all over the world, especially in areas traumatised by conflict and poverty, including former child soldiers in Sri Lanka, street children in Paraguay and those who live in refugee camps in Palestine.
Among the more unusual Fairtrade items they produce are wellington boots, flip-flops, rubber bands, balloons and condoms. He has been invited to Jersey during Fairtrade Fortnight by the Jersey Fairtrade Island Group to talk to schoolchildren.
Tony Allchurch of the Jersey group said they were indebted to The Co-operative Society for its ongoing support of the Fairtrade movement.
'The World Cup in South Africa really brought home to us the unfair gap between the wealth of the best footballers in the world and the extreme poverty of the families who make the footballs for international competitions. We wanted to highlight this issue and Total Sport provided a brilliant solution by supporting our campaign in schools with donations of Fairtrade footballs,' he said.
The Co-operative Society has stocked the sports balls since last summer. They are among more than 200 Fairtrade products sold in their stores in Jersey and Guernsey, many of which will be offered to shoppers during in-store tastings held during the fortnight. Last year Co-operative shoppers in both Bailiwicks spent over £400,000 more on FairTrade goods than previously in 2009.
Chief Commercial Officer, Jim Plumley said paying a fair price direct to producers not only improved their lives but also resulted in savings for consumers.
'We want to play our part in improving the lives of producers in the developing world by doing our best to inform, educate and motivate our customers to buy Fairtrade products. Each of our FairTrade products tells a story; about struggling communities revived and renewed, about schools built or clean water supplied and, most importantly, a level of co-operation and fairness restored,' he said.
