Katy is making her way to Chicago, and I’m headed out the door to Atlanta. But before leaving CRS Fair Trade in the capable hands of our own Mary Peirce, I wanted to post a Fair Trade greeting for the season. What better way than to share a gift from a CRS fan who is bringing Fair Trade to her campus at Loras College? While now on holiday break, Yvette Anderson recently shared these reflections:
“Two things are true for me this holiday season; everything fair trade seems to be a little more expensive than everything not fair trade and college students are flat broke. So why would college students pursue the goal of bringing fair trade items to our college campus? For me, the answer is in my faith.
As a Catholic I am called to recognize and respect the dignity of every human person, and included in this, is learning respect in the economic world, one that maybe isn’t so connected to the “Catholic world”. But the way I see it, every aspect of the secular world is connect to my faith somehow. By coming to a better understanding of the practices and ideologies of the economy I live in, I have seen the injustices occurring all around the world. Many people work in inhumane conditions and receive largely less than a livable wage. The work of millions of people around the world is not being respected under the conventional economic system. As a Catholic, I was taught to question the ideas and ethics of our society. From an economic standpoint, we are confronted with these questions:
“Every perspective on economic life that is human, moral, and Christian
must be shaped by three questions:
What does the economy do for people?
What does it do to people?
And how do people participate in it?”
—Economic Justice for All
So how is this system of “free” trade helping the economy? What does it do for the people? And how do the people participate in it? The answers aren’t necessarily easy to come to, especially when the culture of our economy is based on the idea of free trade as a means to gain profit and sustain a capitalistic society. Free trade is the only idea that the majority of our society know. They hear the term “fair trade” and say, “What’s that?” Fair trade needs to become a more present alternative in our society. Fair trade is the ethical and fair way to practice production and consumerism. Under a fair trade system, the craftsmen and women, the farmers, the workers who produce the majority of consumer products around the world are offered a fair wage; the wealth from our consumer culture is distributed more justly to those whose hands are the laborers. By advocating for a fair trade economic system, we cannot only better respect the human dignity of smaller-scale producers, but we can act in solidarity with those around the world in need. We can ensure that those making our coffee, our chocolate, our home goods, etc. are receiving just compensation, and that our system of profit making doesn’t supersede the worth of a human being.”
Interest in Fair Trade is increasing on Catholic campuses. photo credit: Wetzler Studios for CRS
The break provided at the holiday season is a great time to educate yourself about economic justice. The CRS Fair Trade resources are great conversation starts for family time too!
