Athena Naturals 2045 South Oxford Avenue Los Angeles CA 90018

Cultural Interiors & Gifts 5573 West Pico Blvd. Los Angeles CA 90019

Stefan Chasnov 2017 Kelton Ave. Los Angeles CA 90025

Barlow Guildhouse 2000 Stadium Way Los Angeles CA 90026

New High (M)art 1720 N. Vermont Ave. Los Angeles CA 90027

Kathmandu-LA 5035 Huntington Dr. North Los Angeles CA 90032

ShinyHappyShop.com 4610 Paulhan Avenue Los Angeles CA 90041

SLS Hotel at Beverly Hills 465 S. La Cienega Blvd. Los Angeles CA 90048

Duet Interior Collections 11732 West Pico Blvd Los Angeles CA 90064

SRF India Gift Shop 3233 N San Fernando Road, Unit 6 Los Angeles CA 90065

Nancy Bothne Designs 3247 Rosewood Ave. Los Angeles CA 90066

Library Foundation, The 630 W 5th Street Los Angeles CA 90071

Fowler Museum at UCLA 308 Charles E Young Drive N Los Angeles CA 90095

Curious 128 Pier Ave. Hermosa Beach CA 90254

Magpie 1141 Highland Avenue Manhattan Beach CA 90266

Corners of the World 1 Malaga Cove Plaza Palos Verdes Estates CA 90274

M’Pressions 1700 South Catalina Avenue Redondo Beach CA 90277

Topanga Home Grown 120 South Topanga Canyon Blvd Topanga CA 90290

Ananda 1354 Abbot Kinney Blvd Venice CA 90291

Bridgid Coulter Designs 1419 5th Street Santa Monica CA 90401

Palmetto 1034 Montana Avenue Santa Monica CA 90403

Parkside Pharmacy 2428 Santa Monica Blvd. Santa Monica CA 90404

Arts & Letters 2665 C Main Street Santa Monica CA 90405

something YOU, LLC 5532 Woodruff Avenue Lakewood CA 90713

Hot Stuff Long Beach 2121 E. Broadway Long Beach CA 90803

Fern’s Garden 5308-B E 2nd Street long Beach CA 90803

Sharmonly 3553 Atlantic Ave #1245 Long Beach CA 90807

Family Fair 810 Meridian Avenue S. Pasadena CA 91030

Vroman’s Bookstore 695 E. Colorado Blvd. Pasadena CA 91101

Ten Thousand Villages 567 South Lake Avenue Pasadena CA 91101

Yoga House 11 West State Street Pasadena CA 91105

Norton Simon Museum 411 West Colorado Blvd Pasadena CA 91105

Vida Verde 3425 Fairesta St. La Crescenta CA 91214

Ananda Ashram 5301 Pennsylvania Ave La Crescenta CA 91214

Follow Your Heart 21825 S Sherman Way Canoga Park CA 91303

Artists’ Enclave 7334 De Soto Ave. Canoga Park CA 91303

Ignition Clothing 24208 Valencia Blvd. Valencia CA 91355

Sharondipity 22563 Ventura Blvd Woodland Hills CA 91364

Kingfisher Road 4922 Topanga Canyon Blvd. Woodland Hills CA 91364

Kaiser Hospital 13652 Cantara Street Panorama City CA 91402

Dana Drug Store 317 North Pass Avenue Burbank CA 91505

Buddhamouse 134 Yale Ave Claremont CA 91711

Premiere 217 W Las Tumas Dr San Gabriel CA 91776

Perfect 10 Communications 3080 W. Valley Blvd. Alhambra CA 91803

Holy Family Bookstore 1527 Fremont Avenue South Pasadena CA 91030

CSU Northridge 18111 Nordhoff St. Northridge CA 91330

Now is the time to show greater support and really make this, “Way of Living,” Reality.

CONGRATULATIONS TO CLAREMONT ON BECOMING A FAIR TRADE TOWN

Claremont council approves resolution making it a Fair Trade Town

Kimberly Balint, left, loan officer for W.J. Mortgage Capital and Eric Hogan, loan officer for Mission Hill Mortgage Bankers talk with Jay Shneider, sales representative for Day Creek Highland in Rancho Cucamonga. during the Agent/Builder Palooza on Wednesday. (LaFonzo Carter/ Staff Photographer)

April 26, 2012

Congratulations to the 14 finalists of “Best in Fair Trade” Awards! Finalists were selected from 46 organizations suggested by 60 public nominations. The public now votes until April 30 to pick 1 winner for each category.

FTRN created the contest since no awards existed to honor organizations across all major Fair Trade recognitions. Winners will be celebrated during World Fair Trade Day in May!

More at “Best in Fair Trade” Award finalists

In March, Fair Trade Towns USA sent 12 volunteer organizers on a 7 day learning tour of Fair Trade farms in Dominican Republic. The travelers came from town and city campaigns all over the country to see the effects of their hard work visiting cocoa, coffee and banana farms, as well as a sweat-free apparel factory.  This series chronicles the trip through the eyes of a different organizer each day.

This blog post comes to us from Lisa Dunaway of Fair Trade Winter Park

On our final day in the Dominican Republic, the delegation visited COOPPROBATA, a Fair Trade banana cooperative in Azua. This was everyone’s first visit to a banana farm and we had no prior expectations.

When our weary, yet enthusiastic group arrived at the COOPPROBATA offices, we were greeted warmly by several members of the group including: Jorge, the General Manager, Production Manager Luis De La Cruz, Alcedo Beitro of the Technical Assistance Program and Jose Gomez, an engineer in the Certification and Quality Compliance Department. We were welcomed into the bright green building, which was recently purchased by the cooperative, and then guided outside to the backyard where we formed a circle and began our meeting and under the shade of a mango tree.

We started with introductions and then Jorge told us about the history and current state of COOPPROBATA.  The cooperative was started in 1994 with 162 producers. From the very beginning, the group cultivated their bananas organically, using no harmful chemicals or pesticides. In 1994 they became Fair Trade Certified and began a series of annual programs to benefit their community. So far, Fair Trade social premiums have allowed COOPPROBATA to fund scholarships for seven students, literacy programs, and educational campaigns in gender equality and anti- child labor. COOPPROBATA has also used the Fair Trade social premiums to pay for necessary surgeries for producer members and members of their local community.

In addition, the cooperative has created environmental campaigns to educate the community about reducing waste, conservation and reduction in deforestation.  The leaders of the cooperative feel very strongly about organic cultivation. They reiterated to the group that organic farming protects the people and preserves the planet.

Currently, COOPPROBATA exports bananas only to Europe.  Sadly, there is not enough of a demand for Fair Trade or even organic bananas in the United States.  Members of the cooperative believe that more education is needed in the United States about the importance of how Fair Trade standards benefit farming for several reasons. For example, there is a myth that organic farming is not necessary for bananas because the thick peel protects the fruit from the harmful chemicals. However, when pesticides are used, they are absorbed into the soil and the roots of the trees, which are the source of nutrients to the fruit.  More importantly, harmful pesticides are the cause of severe illness to the producers who work in the fields everyday.

The producers of COOPPROBATA take pride in the safe working conditions for their producers and all of the workers in the processing plant. As we toured the facility and the banana farm we saw safety posters throughout. There were even safety posters attached to trees, deep in the farm to remind workers of the emergency procedures.

The farmers have a profound pride in the quality of their bananas.  We were carefully guided through the entire process of production, from the beginning when the fruit is just a flower on the tree, to the sorting and cleaning process, all the way to the final fruits being loaded on a refrigeration truck that transports the bananas to the export locations.

Throughout the entire process, our guides explained that quality is very important to their cooperative.

As we prepared to leave, Jose Gomez thanked us for our visit and explained to us that visitors such as our Fair Trade Towns delegation help them and the growers realize that their hard work and sacrifices are being appreciated. Our interest and support help keep them motivated while the Fair Trade market enables them to grow their communities and improve the overall well being of their producers and communities. They believe that only conscience consumers will help this movement grow and encouraged us to visit again.

http://www.fairtradetownsusa.org/news/day-at-cooprobata-bananas-that-protect-the-people-and-preserve-the-planet/

Ramona demonstrating the coffee cupping and quality tasting process at the FEDECARES Coffee Cooperative’s National Offices

Ramona Cesarina Encarnacion slurps, swishes and spits her 130 degree coffee in a humid, warm room of the FEDECARES coffee cooperative’s national offices in San Cristobal, Dominican Republic. Director of the FEDECARES Coffee Lab, Ramona is an agronomist  college degree was financed by the education scholarship offered through her family’s membership in the ASOCAEZ Coffee Association.

One of 40 FEDECARES recipients of such educational scholarships   funded by Fair Trade social premiums, Ramona gives us our own education on coffee during our Fair Trade Towns visit to the Coffee Lab. She teaches us about “cupping,” the process of determining attributes and qualities of different coffees.

Fair Trade guarantees many things for growers worldwide: a fair minimum price and social premiums, technical assistance, environmental protections, transparent cooperative structures, and no forced child labor. Consumers trust the Fair Trade label to uphold these standards, but there is one major attribute that is not included in Fair Trade Certified products – quality.

Visiting Fair Trade cocoa and coffee cooperatives in the Dominican Republic clearly illustrates that that this is a myth; there are many inherent quality controls in the production of Fair Trade Certified items, and consumers in the US who buy Fair Trade take home delicious, high quality coffee and chocolate that also empowers producers abroad.

Quality control is essential for any business to succeed, and Fair Trade products are no exception. The 7,500 small holder coffee farmers of FEDECARES know this; they will not be able to sell their beans and sustain themselves if the quality of their beans are not the very best. Ramona at FEDECARES knows this, too, and goes so far to request defective samples from rural farmers “to determine ways to improve” the quality of such beans. Indeed, every coffee sample from FEDECARES is cupped by five different expert tasters within the organization before it is sent to the Dominican Coffee Council, a mandatory governmental tasting body for export coffee.

Hector Romero,our tour coordinator at the Grupo CONACADO, knows the importance of good quality, too. We learned about the precise steps CONACADO takes to ensure the best quality cocoa is exported to international buyers. Beans are fermented in 3 separate marked boxes for 72 hours, then moved to huge greenhouses to dry. Updated worksheets are posted on every fermenting box and in every drying room, indicating the particular quality and stages of the beans.

Romero discusses the fermenting boxes. Cocoa beans must ferment in three boxes for 72 hours to fully develop their deepest flavors and nuances.

Romero demonstrates a humidity monitor machine, which tests the drying cocoa beans to ensure they achieve a 7% internal humidity level. He shows us the guillotine, a simple mandolin-like apparatus that cuts into samples of drying cocoa beans to ensure that mold and pests are not problematic. No more than one out of 50 beans can be imperfect, Romero tells us, if more than that, the entire batch drying must be discarded.

Romero holds the “guillotine” apparatus, which tests the drying cocoa beans to ensure quality is up to par: CONACADO discards entire batches of drying cocoa beans if there is any signs of mold or insects.

“Farmers are conscious of the reality,” says Romero. He explains that CONACADO’s 10,000 cocoa farmers know that the quality of their beans directly impacts the amount they can sell.  These farmers grow and harvest their beans with this core value in mind. Beans not meeting CONACADO’s quality standards are not sold to Fair Trade cocoa buyers; there is a clearly-marked separate drying facility for these non-Fair Trade beans.

Romero holds the “guillotine” apparatus, which tests the drying cocoa beans to ensure quality is up to par: CONACADO discards entire batches of drying cocoa beans if there is any signs of mold or insects.

Fair Trade farmers and cooperatives in the Dominican Republic monitor and improve the quality of their products at every step of the growing, harvesting, drying and production process. Savvy and intuitive, these farmers know that they must offer the best quality products possible to sell their products and bring in repeat business.

Fair Trade certification guarantees that producers receive economic and social benefits for their products. But consumers can also confidently buy Fair Trade products for the high quality of the products in and of themselves. Just look to Ramona at FEDECARES for this vote of confidence: despite cupping between 10-35 samples of coffee per day for her job at FEDECARES, she loves the taste of FEDECARES coffee so much that she indulges in an additional 8 full cups of the coffee a day.