Opening our eyes (The Fair Trade Ethical Trading Program)

Member Name: josollsam

Product:	The Fair Trade Ethical Trading Program
Date:	22/12/01 (119 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Great idea, theoretically

Disadvantages: Try telling large Corporations about it

In order to truly be able to perceive the problem of how the 3rd world is being abused and exploited for the riches few, it is necessary to put the whole world into a perspective that we can relate to easily. When we think of the 6 billion people on the planet right now, it is hard to actually see things as they are.

If we could shrink the earth's population to a village of precisely 100
people, with all the existing human ratios remaining the same, it would look something like the following:

There would be:
57 Asians

21 Europeans

14 from the Western Hemisphere, both north and south

8 Africans

52 would be female

48 would be male

70 would be nonwhite

30 would be white

70 would be non-Christian

30 would be Christian

89 would be heterosexual

11 would be homosexual

6 people would possess 59% of the entire world's wealth and all 6 would be
from the United States.

80 would live in substandard housing

70 would be unable to read

50 would suffer from malnutrition

1 would be near death

1 would be near birth

1 (yes, only 1) would have a college education

1 would own a computer

When one considers our world from such a compressed perspective, the need
for
acceptance, understanding and education becomes glaringly apparent.

The following is also something to ponder...

If you woke up this morning with more health than illness...you are more
blessed than the million who will not survive this week.

If you have never experienced the danger of battle, the loneliness of
imprisonment, the agony of torture, or the pangs of starvation ... you are
ahead of 500 million people in the world.

If you can attend a church meeting without fear of harassment, arrest,
torture, or death...you ar
e more blessed than three billion people in the
world.

If you have food in the refrigerator, clothes on your back, a roof over your

head and a place to sleep...you are richer than 75% of this world.

If you have money in the bank, in your wallet, and spare change in a dish
someplace ... you are among the top 8% of the world's wealthy.

If you can read this message you are more blessed than over two billion
people in the world who cannot read at all.

I think that the above shows us just how unfair life for the VAST majority is. It is vital that the distribution of wealth is more evenly spread but until people open their eyes and actually see what is going on this will never happen.

We, in the west, refuse to see the exploitation. We refuse to think about whose tiny fingers made those trainers you are putting on your feet, whose small hands are sewing those jeans we pay so much for in our shops.

The money made from those trainers and jeans and all the other commodities we buy goes to...not those children making them.

Fair trading? The large corporations will just follow the trail around the world to find anyone anywhere who must sell their labour at whatever price the corporation will pay. Fair trading eats into corporate profits so is a no-go, no way issue for them.

Until we decide that we won't support the exploitation of people for our 'necessary' fashion items it will continue.

Who will be the first one to say "actually I don't need to wear 'label' clothing. It is not as important as human life"? Well? I don't hear you.

Summary: