Fairtrade Gold in Birmingham

A bit late putting this up, but great video

FAB market at Sustainability fair

Excellent day in Victoria Square, as part of Birmingham's Sustainability Fair.  Here are a few photos from the day:

Traidcraft tour Southern India

Gill and John Parkin presents Traidcraft 'Meet the People' tour to Southern India, 2012 
(presented at All Saints Social Justice Group, February):

We started off in Kerala, landing in Kozhikode (formerly Calicut) spending some time in the city
visiting Fair Trade Alliance Kerala and visiting farmers in the hills to the north east of the city.
From there we went south by train to Allepuzha and spent one night on the backwaters before
working our way east visiting a tea growing area and the Periyar wildlife park. From there we
crossed the central Ghats into Tamil Nadu to visit a project called “Reaching the Unreached”
(which is a talk in its own right) and the Meenaskshi Temple in Madurai before travelling by
overnight train to Chennai and then by road to Pondicherry. There we visited various projects,
some connected with Traidcraft.



Fair Trade Alliance Kerala (FTAK) is spread throughout Kerala covering 3,000 small farmers
in six districts.

FAB celebrates fairtrade fairmined gold

Members of FAB will be walking from Victoria Square to the Jewellery Quarter on Saturday 3rd March at midday to celebrate Fairmined Gold, a new and exciting development of ethical trade.  FAB is using the theme of Fairtrade Fortnight of “Make your step count” to follow the tourist trail of footsteps to the Jewellery Quarter and promote Fairmined Gold. They are being joined by Jewellery Quarter’s Cookson Gold and Weston Beamor who supply Fairmined Gold to the trade.

Fairtrade and Fairmined certified gold, the world's first independent ethical certification system for gold, will offer you the guarantee of a product which has been responsibly mined. All Fairtrade and Fairmined gold is mined from small-scale and artisan mines in a way that seeks to reduce dependence on harmful chemicals. Good news for mining communities in South America and good news for the people who live and mine there. Look carefully and you'll find the Fairtrade and Fairmined stamp on the inside of every piece.

'I think that Fairtrade is going to help us to sell our gold at the right price and we will be better paid. It will also help the environment.' Gina Dávila, mineral sorter, Sotrami Mine.

FAB have been supporting a range of promotional events throughout Fairtrade Fortnight to promote ethical trade and encourage people of Birmingham and the West Midlands to support retailers who sell Fairtrade goods.

John Boyle Chair of FAB:

“ this celebratory walk is a simple step toward making peoples lives better, by encouraging people in the UK to shop with their heart they will benefit those who have no choices due to their absolute poverty.”

For further information please contact:
John Boyle
07736792518
john.boyle@midlands.coop

Aston University Go Green Week

Aston University will be hosting our third annual Go Green Week from Monday 6^th – Friday 10^th February 2012.

The week is intended to raise awareness about sustainability (including issues of fairtrade) and is open to our staff, students and the general public. One of the main events we will be holding this year is an ‘eco-market’. The market will be held on Tuesday 7^th February, from 11.30am – 2.30pm in our Student Guild Hall. In previous years these events have been very popular and we would like to get as many local organisations and people involved as possible - there will be local stallholders, sustainable catering and information stands.

See more - http://www1.aston.ac.uk/about/environment/go-green-awards/

Victoria Johnsen
Environment and Sustainability Officer
Estates and Capital Development

Rangoli FT logo

Our first entry to FAB FOOD Photo competition - keep sending them in!  Closing date is 1st October.


'Rangoli' Fairtrade logo, made with damsons, apples and beans.  


Wiki - Rangoli is a traditional decorative folk art of India. These are decorative designs made on floors of living rooms and courtyards during Hindu festivals and are meant as sacred welcoming areas for the Hindu deities.^[1]...Rangoli is a symbol of religious and cultural beliefs. It is considered an important part of the spiritual process. why the various gifts and sacrifices in the 'altar' are created when creating the माँडने. Rural Anchaloan home - yard Buharkar Llypane still exists after the custom of making rangoli. Land - called the purification of the spirit and prosperity lies behind it...Rangoli symbolizes joy and happiness Rangamayie expressions.


For more food art ideas, see:


Stan's Cafe 'Veg City' 
What makes School?
Foodscapes: amazing food art by Carl Warne

There's a lot of images, slideshows, stuff on google and youtube on food art.  One of my favourites below:

Creative Co-operatives

Starting a Co-operative in the Creative Industries

Are you a freelancer, graduate, pracitioner or adviser?

Find out about Co-operatives and co-operative ways of working.  Meet potential collaborators.  Talk to people who've been there and done it. Share ideas.

• See the Electro-Swing Circus, Birmingham's newest creative co-operative
• Meet experienced co-operators from Wave Desing and Co-operative Web
• Get expert business development advice from Co-operative Futures
  
  
  To book follow link:
  
  
  http://creativeco-operativesbirmingham.eventbrite.com/

FAB Food Photos

FAB meeting – 19th May 2011

Present:
Lorraine (Birmingham City Council – Sustainability Officer), Charlotte
(Traces of Rock), Marcus (Community Art Worker), Sian (Sustainability West Midlands),
Lizzie (University of Birmingham Sustainability), Jane (University of Birmingham
Procurement)

Appologies: John, Steve, Sylvia, Paul

Matters Arising: At the AGM Paul had suggested a scheme through which FAB could award local
businesses Fairtrade status (as the Fairtrade Foundation does not have a scheme). Paul is in discussions
to get this set up.

Website, Facebook etc.

It was commented that from the website it was unclear that everyone who is interested in ethical
trading is welcome to join FAB and come along to the meetings. This resulted in discussion about the
use of FAB’s blog and Twitter to communicate better. Everyone was encouraged to add their comments
to help generate interest.

It was suggested that we blog for a volunteer to sort out the website as it is dormant but is still being
paid for. A decision needs to be made whether to stop paying and just keep the domain name or to re-
design the website.

There was discussion about how FAB could use the blog – e.g. businesses that sell Fairtrade and ethical
goods could be listed in a directory; minutes of meetings could go on – this may encourage new people
to join. Criteria for gaining Fairtrade status could be put on Twitter and hopefully this would get them to
join in.

Marcus is keen to continue working on a Youth Forum – it should be possible to get funding. Other
suggestions for involving young people were Envision (6th formers projects including Fairtrade) and
young persons’ version of Paul’s business scheme. Schools can link via social media.

Lorraine informed the group that there will be a Climate Change Festival 5th – 9th June 2012 with a
sporting theme (because of the Olympics). It is likely there’ll be an X-Factor type show on the stage
rather than paying for acts and events such as an unfair football match or unfair tug of war.

Next meeting 16th June, 5.30pm at Co-op Member Relations Centre, BMI, Margaret Street, B3 3BS

Saturday 28th May, Friends of the Earth market, Fighting Cocks pub Moseley.

Sunday 19th June, Community Day, University of Birmingham, B15 2TT

Sunday 26th June, 11am – 2 pm Celebrate Co-operation, Hilton Metropole Hotel, NEC B40 1PP

Sunday 25th September – ‘Fun in the Park’ Solihull Fairtrade group.

Saturday 10th March – Fairtrade Fortnight Ethical and Sustainable Market, Birmingham city centre.

Fair trade enters the Dragons Den

Piecing together a story from B'ham Archive images

Over the last three weeks over 100 young people from Holy Trinity Catholic Media Arts College have been working on their own ideas for fair and ethical trading to appeal to young people in Birmingham.

Their creative ideas could be developed with the support of Fairtrade Association Birmingham and Creative Partnerships.  Their enquiry 'should all trade be fair?' was supported by a range of our different fair trade experts who made presentations about their practice, and answer any questions about the ideas of the young people.
Apart from the obvious enthusiasm of young people to explore fairness and trading, there are a range of curriculum learning objectives that could be covered by this project. We supported learning by offering a range of different workshops covering related issues:

• Birmingham and Fair Trade - Marcus Belben (Bham Archives and Heritage)
• Marketing and Publicity - Marcia Springer (Bright Space)
• The Cooperative movement - John Boyle (Midlands Coop)
• Fairtrade and film, John Cooper (Just film Cooperative)
• Trade and Charity, Sylvia Gardner (LUCIA)
• Faith and Fair trade, Karem Issa (Faiths Act Fellow with the Tony Blair Faith Foundation).

Mapping out where goods have come from to make their clothes

The dragons den was hosted at Holy Trinity, the panel including young people, teaching staff and Jane Colbourne (FAB secretary and procurements manager, University of Birmingham).  Each class from year 8 presented one of their ideas, including clothing for young women, sportswear, drinks and make up, mobile phones and an app to find fairtrade goods, footwear including fairtrade trainers (Fairtrainers+, the dragon's den winners) and not forgetting chocolate.

Clothing designed during project

Presentations were mostly organised with powerpoint, including drama, artwork and a rap, all demonstrating the understanding of young people and their creative approach, in their words, to 'young people changing the world'

Sushan Dasgupta also coordinated a meeting at Shared Earth, on 10th March to discuss and develop a youth forum for young people and schools across Birmingham. Our work at Holy Trinity and all the other schools we have worked with over fairtrade fortnight in Birmingham, has demonstrated a need to collaborate more with young people to develop their campaigns on fair and ethical trading in Birmingham.