Accents
By Julia Carreon-Lagoc

The global breadth of fair trade

Aug. 10 at the Regional Trial Court in Guimbal, Romeo Capalla, Manager of the Panay Fair Trade Center, stood trial while outside hundreds of peasant-workers and farmers were braving the inclement weather in full support for their manager. The placards they were holding revolved on one theme: grave injustice done to Capalla—arrested and incarcerated for having committed “destructive arson” as alleged in the information filed by the provincial prosecutor's office.

Because the wheels of justice run annoyingly, exceedingly, excruciatingly slow (I like to be verbose about this), Capalla will languish in the provincial jail until the next hearing. Meanwhile, the fair trade workers continue with their rally on the outskirt of the jail. But what's fair trade by the way?

The Panay Fair Trade Center (PFTC) is located right in my home town, Oton, in Sitio Manue, Brgy. Tagbac Sur. It was started in 1991 by KABALAKA (Kababaenhan Laban sa Karahasan), a women's organization. Kabalaka means concern, a poor English equivalent that cannot quite fathom the depth of its vernacular meaning. The depth of concern is shown in how much PFTC has grown from being mainly a women's project where the urban poor women process into finished products the raw materials supplied by the farmers.

PFTC has evolved into “a business enterprise owned by people's organizations in Panay.” The sprouting of various organized communities producing and selling natural and organic products was a vision realized. About 300 family-based memberships comprise the work force in these people's organizations. KAMADA (Katilingban sang Mangunguma sa Dabong), PITAFA (Pisang-Tamuan Farmers Association) supply muscovado sugar and raw bananas which are processed into banana chips. NAGKAKAISA and SAMPCO (San Antonio Multi-purpose Cooperative, an organization of poor families in my own barangay) do the packing of muscovado and processing of banana chips.

PFTC also works with SISSFA, a producer organization in Antique; local chapters of the national organization AMIHAN; BCPWA, a local banana chips producers' association; and FIFA (Federation of Iloilo Farmers Association), the local chapter of Kilusang Magbubukid sa Pilipinas.

Organic certified is PFTC's muscovado sugar. Considered a more nutritious sweetener than the refined white sugar, muscovado retains most of its vitamin and mineral content because it is processed naturally. PFTC buys muscovado from KAMADA and PITAFA which are then packed at the PFTC plant. Banana chips, the other PFTC product, is a natural snack food from green bananas produced by organizations of small farmers. Also organic certified, no harmful synthetic ingredients are included in the cooking. Both muscovado and banana chips come from environment-friendly agricultural produce.

Where businessmen advertise their companies as “capitalism with a conscience” while at the same time squeezing labor with exploitative practices, fair trade goes by the dictum “fair trade for social justice.” The Fair Trade Federation (FTF), an association of fair trade wholesalers, retailers and producers, is “committed to providing fair wages and good employment opportunities to economically disadvantaged artisans and farmers worldwide.”

Why global breadth? PFTC, for instance, has nine fair trade linkages abroad: CTM Altromercato (in Italy), EZA (Austria), Drittewielt Partner and GEPA (Germany), TRAIDCRAFT (United Kingdom), OXFAM (Great Britain), OXFAM WERELDWINKELS (Belgium), SOLIDARE MONDE (France), and ALTERNATIVA 3 (Spain). PFTC's international affiliations further show the extent of its global trading: IFAT (International Federation for Alternative Trade), Asia Forum, Etimos in Italy, and Fair Trade Labelling Organization of Sugar Registry – Europe (FLO). Gepa Fair Handelshaus, “the biggest Fair Trade Organisation in Europe, trading with about 150 producer organisations in Africa, Asia and Latinamerica,” has been working with PFTC for eight years now. Gepa has received the manager and board members of PFTC on their visits to Europe and also visited PFTC in Iloilo.

In Oakland, California, I remember dropping by the Global Exchange store with my daughter Rose who didn't pass up buying an indigenous product (I cannot now recall what it was she bought), but I did look for something from the Philippines and found Igorot mahogany carvings. This daughter who understands how Big Business works (Rose holds a masteral management degree on a scholarship at the Asian Institute of Management) has told me not to haggle with the itinerant kalamansi and avocado vendors in the homeland because “they earn so pitiably little.” An advocate of fair trade, Rose frequents the Farmers' Market and Costplus (plus is for the poor workers of the country of origin) because “buying fair trade products support living wages in the developing world.”

Now let me put down in my shopping list PFTC's muscovado sugar and nutritious banana chips. (Comments to lagoc@hargray.com)