Fair Trade Products

Talleyrand

I became interested in this when my room mate told me that one of his college professors claimed that Nestle chocolate was made by slaves in Africa. Of course my initial reaction was "lol wut". I mean we all know that higher education has a liberal bias and that this is probably an ill-informed and outlandish accusation made by some aging hippy. There's no way that modern countries are still profiting from slave labor....right?

http://www.corpwatch.org/article.php?id=12754

The truth behind the chocolate is anything but sweet. On the Ivory Coast of Africa, the origin of nearly half of the world's cocoa, hundreds of thousands of children work or are enslaved on cocoa farms. With poverty running rampant and average cocoa revenues ranging from $30-$108 per household member per year, producers have no choice but to utilize child labor for dangerous farming tasks. Some children, seeking to help their poor families, even end up as slaves on cocoa farms far from home. Slavery drags on and we are paying the slaveholder's wages.

This may be old news but I certainly didn't know about it until recently. Soooo if I make a vow to never again buy nonfair-trade labeled chocolate again is that actually an effective way to fight slavery or is it wishful thinking? I've always had a lot of resentment against corporations but thought that the best way to stop things like Wal-mart encouraging their workers to apply for welfare instead of providing benefits themselves or meat packing plant workers in Texas not getting compensated when a limb gets chopped off was by voting with your dollar. This is where fair trade comes in.

http://www.fairtradefederation.org/ht/d/Home/pid/175

The thing is their search engine doesn't bring up anything in the Dallas area. They claim on another site to supply fair trade products to places like Krogers, Walmart, and Target which means I don't have to bump elbows with hippies at the local organic foods and beads shop but I don't recall ever seeing their logo on anything. Of course I haven't been looking for it but I generally give something a once over before I buy it and I should be able to recall seeing something labeled as fair-trade licensed at least once.

They do have a list of large scale companies but not individual products. I can't remember who makes what when I stop by the grocery store. So does anyone look for FTF products? Are they hard to pick out? Will I ever be able to enjoy chocolate again?

dgs095

Talleyrand wrote: »

http://www.corpwatch.org/article.php?id=12754

The truth behind the chocolate is anything but sweet. On the Ivory Coast of Africa, the origin of nearly half of the world's cocoa, hundreds of thousands of children work or are enslaved on cocoa farms. With poverty running rampant and average cocoa revenues ranging from $30-$108 per household member per year, producers have no choice but to utilize child labor for dangerous farming tasks. Some children, seeking to help their poor families, even end up as slaves on cocoa farms far from home. Slavery drags on and we are paying the slaveholder's wages.

http://www.fairtradefederation.org/ht/d/Home/pid/175

The thing is their search engine doesn't bring up anything in the Dallas area. They claim on another site to supply fair trade products to places like Krogers, Walmart, and Target which means I don't have to bump elbows with hippies at the local organic foods and beads shop but I don't recall ever seeing their logo on anything. Of course I haven't been looking for it but I generally give something a once over before I buy it and I should be able to recall seeing something labeled as fair-trade licensed at least once.

They do have a list of large scale companies but not individual products. I can't remember who makes what when I stop by the grocery store. So does anyone look for FTF products? Are they hard to pick out? Will I ever be able to enjoy chocolate again?

I've never looked for the logo/fair trade making on a product. It might not have been enough of an issue to warrant the label in your area. I'm good with a price sticker and maybe an "organic" sticker on my fruit. But I went shopping once and they had "low fat" stickers on the bananas.

Clearly they think people are too silly to realize a banana is low fat on their own, but their product selection will be swayed by a sticker. If they think a fair trade sticker will sell stuff, it will appear. Until then, best of luck.

I do often check products for the "made in ______" label, just for interest sake. I try to get most of my food from Canada/USA/New Zealand out of concern regarding things like unregulated pesticide use and deforestation. I make exceptions when I want to though, those tiny Christmas mandarin oranges are too tasty to give up, I never looked into the practices that go into putting tasty mandarin oranges on my table......I guess you could say I turn a blind eye when it suits me.

Tofystedeth

My wife pointed me to this site which ranks companies in various fields based on their ecological, social, business practices, so you can find products from companies you don't feel bad about supporting.

My parents are trying to start a Ten Thousand Villages store in Dallas. We had a store over Christmas a couple years ago in Northpark Mall, that did really well (even sold some chairs to Luke Wilson), but it didn't pull in enough over the 2 months or so to give them enough starting capital.

Talleyrand

Tofystedeth wrote: »

My wife pointed me to this site which ranks companies in various fields based on their ecological, social, business practices, so you can find products from companies you don't feel bad about supporting.

Thanks, I believe that's exactly what I was looking for.

On a related note that same room-mate just sent me this link on the meat packing industry.
http://www.motherjones.com/news/feature/2001/07/meatpacking.html

According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, meatpacking is the nation's most dangerous occupation. In 1999, more than one-quarter of America's nearly 150,000 meatpacking workers suffered a job-related injury or illness. The meatpacking industry not only has the highest injury rate, but also has by far the highest rate of serious injury—more than five times the national average, as measured in lost workdays. If you accept the official figures, about 40,000 meatpacking workers are injured on the job every year. But the actual number is most likely higher. The meatpacking industry has a well-documented history of discouraging injury reports, falsifying injury data, and putting injured workers back on the job quickly to minimize the reporting of lost workdays. Over the past four years, I've met scores of meatpacking workers in Nebraska, Colorado, and Texas who tell stories of being injured and then discarded by their employers. Like Kenny Dobbins, many now rely on public assistance for their food, shelter, and medical care. Each new year throws more injured workers on the dole, forcing taxpayers to subsidize the meatpacking industry's poor safety record. No government statistics can measure the true amount of pain and suffering in the nation's meatpacking communities today.

And now the meat? Is nothing sacred?!

dlinfiniti

when i was in college, some student group was trying to promote fair trade practices by selling fair trade versions of food court items. I gotta say, the fair trade coffee was the grossest coffee i've ever had.

redx

I've had free trade tea, and it was quite good. Better than most of the other loose leaf stuff I've had.

It's really easy to screw up coffee by being a filthy hippy who knows nothing about making a decent cup of coffee.

ege02

Fair trade.

Fair to whom?

Casually Hardcore

Problem with the world is that everything have some sort of shit on it.

You can either: notice the shit, grimace, and eat it anyway; or notice the shit, refuse to eat it and die; or notice the shit, and spend a truckload of money on fair trade items and forever be paranoid on were you products originate.

Personally I would like to start a vegetable garden.

redx

ege02 wrote: »

Fair trade.

Fair to whom?

they are fair to the worker and community where the product is grown, in the view of the people that run the free trade group thingy.

I'm sure they have FAQs describing the criteria they use somewhere, though I don't see it on the linked site.

Talleyrand

ethugs4life wrote: »

Problem with the world is that everything have some sort of shit on it.

You can either: notice the shit, grimace, and eat it anyway; or notice the shit, refuse to eat it and die; or notice the shit, and spend a truckload of money on fair trade items and forever be paranoid on were you products originate.

That's the way I've seen things for a long time. I still don't go for a lot of environmentalism stuff since it seems more like ritual hand-washing and ego-boosting rather than an effective way to make the world better. For example, I could go my whole life not using hairspray or anything with too many CFC's but one single airplane is going to dump more chemicals in the air than I could in my whole lifetime.

On the other hand the environment is a lot more abstact and complex issue than saying that Nestle chocolate tastes like black people's tears. In this documentary they interview an "African involuntary agricultural worker" who, referring to people who eat the chocolate made from the cocoa beans they harvest, says "They are eating my flesh".

To be honest I don't like people who solely use guilt to motivate others and I am some what unnerved by the prospect of changing my shopping habits because some company happens to have gotten a F rating on some website for some reasons that I'm not actually aware of. But is it really that big a deal to decide to just boycott a few things here and there? Isn't it fatalistic and lazy to say that "Things suck and always will, just try to be happy about it"? Yeah, I don't buy that. Pun not intended. Instead of making a conscious decision to remain ignorant and blissful I've decided that since my role in life is to be yet another happy little consumer at the very least I can give two shits about other people and use my incredible consuming powers for good rather than indifference. You seem to think that it's not worth the cost and overall will affect my standard of living negatively. No I think that it will make my life even more fulfilling to be motivated by a strong sense of purpose rather than simple blind self-indulgence.

Here's a more in-depth link for those of us in the U.S.
http://www.transfairusa.org/content/about/overview.php

I know where you're coming from if you view all this preachy hoopla with a cynical mindset. I certainly don't want to be yet another ignorant joiner who could actually be making the situation worse rather than better.

Solvent

At the Uni I go to we get people pushing Fair Trade coffee a lot. I went to a discussion group on it recently. I think fair trade is stupid, and although it can achieve certain goals that may be noble, there are much better ways to achieve those goals, without the side effects.

I absolutely would suggest voting with your dollar and vetoing products that utilise slavery though.


I have one basic thing against the Fair Trade coffee peddled at our campus, and a host of supporting stuff that would take a long time to get into. The main argument I tend to be fed is that poor African farmers are paid a very, very low price for coffee for a variety of reasons (the stockmarket is evil olol it causes third-world poverty). What fairtrade does is pay these farmers above a market rate, so it's easier for them to live off the proceeds (of course, there are other arguments for fairtrade as well, I'm trying to distill it).

Now, reduced to those basics, which as I'm said I'm given most often, (but yeah again it's a complex issue plenty more arguments for and against), fairtrade seems to ignore the fact that one of the reasons the price of coffee is so low is that there's so many suppliers worldwide. Huge, huge numbers of people growing coffee. There's so much out there, that we don't have to pay a high price because there's surplus stock we can basically buy up for cheap if someone tries to charge us more.
What will happen though if you then say, well this price isn't 'fair' to poor farmers, and try to pay people a higher price? If people can get more money for their produce than they did previously, then it's going to give them an incentive to grow more coffee. It's going to give other people who aren't growing coffee an incentive to begin growing coffee once they see these fairtrade-supported farmers making an above-market return on their investment.
So basically, it's good for a little while that poorer farmers get more money, but then it creates an environment where more coffee is grown. And so you add higher supply to already high supply, and that just creates greater pressure on the price of coffee to drop even further. What do we do with the excess coffee? Go drop it off a boat into the Indian ocean I suppose.

Although many latte-left campus hippies who seem to hate my Faculty think that I'm against African farmers, and think that I wish death upon third-world babies, I really don't. But I don't believe fairtrade is an effective way to help the situation. There are better methods.

Talleyrand

Thanks for the reality check Solvent. I've known for a while how complex of an issue third world sweatshops are which seems to be very similar to the issue of buying produce from these same places. Are they raising the standard of living in developing countries or exploiting poor people? Who's responsible for abusing the workers, the companies or the local foremen? For a long time I never bought gas from Citgo since my dad is boycotting it. Then I eventually decided to do the research and came out deciding that Hugo Chavez is a pretty cool guy. Eh nationalizes Venezuela's oil industry and doesn't afraid of anything.
It certainly taught me not to take any kind of protesting at its face value.

I never went to real college so I never got exposed to all the corporation bashing and activism so it's not likely that I'm going to be buying expensive and bad coffee from students anytime soon. The good side is that because of all this socially conscious shopping I'll never have to step into another Wal-mart again.

Raiden333

Solvent wrote: »

What do we do with the excess coffee? Go drop it off a boat into the Indian ocean I suppose.

Well, I farmed for a year and grew a crop of corn
That stretched as far as the eye can see
That's a whole lot of cornflakes,
Near enough to feed New York till 1973
Cultivation is my station and the nation
Buys my corn from me immediately
And holding sixty thousand bucks, I watch as dumper trucks
Tip New York's corn flakes in the sea

JebusUD

Talleyrand wrote: »

Hugo Chavez is a pretty cool guy.

eh? *shrug* jury is still out for me.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Criticism_of_Hugo_Ch%C3%A1vez

Talleyrand

Thanks for the link. I appreciate seeing both sides to the issue.

TheCrumblyCracker

Solvent wrote: »

At the Uni I go to we get people pushing Fair Trade coffee a lot. I went to a discussion group on it recently. I think fair trade is stupid, and although it can achieve certain goals that may be noble, there are much better ways to achieve those goals, without the side effects.

I absolutely would suggest voting with your dollar and vetoing products that utilise slavery though.


I have one basic thing against the Fair Trade coffee peddled at our campus, and a host of supporting stuff that would take a long time to get into. The main argument I tend to be fed is that poor African farmers are paid a very, very low price for coffee for a variety of reasons (the stockmarket is evil olol it causes third-world poverty). What fairtrade does is pay these farmers above a market rate, so it's easier for them to live off the proceeds (of course, there are other arguments for fairtrade as well, I'm trying to distill it).

Now, reduced to those basics, which as I'm said I'm given most often, (but yeah again it's a complex issue plenty more arguments for and against), fairtrade seems to ignore the fact that one of the reasons the price of coffee is so low is that there's so many suppliers worldwide. Huge, huge numbers of people growing coffee. There's so much out there, that we don't have to pay a high price because there's surplus stock we can basically buy up for cheap if someone tries to charge us more.
What will happen though if you then say, well this price isn't 'fair' to poor farmers, and try to pay people a higher price? If people can get more money for their produce than they did previously, then it's going to give them an incentive to grow more coffee. It's going to give other people who aren't growing coffee an incentive to begin growing coffee once they see these fairtrade-supported farmers making an above-market return on their investment.
So basically, it's good for a little while that poorer farmers get more money, but then it creates an environment where more coffee is grown. And so you add higher supply to already high supply, and that just creates greater pressure on the price of coffee to drop even further. What do we do with the excess coffee? Go drop it off a boat into the Indian ocean I suppose.

Although many latte-left campus hippies who seem to hate my Faculty think that I'm against African farmers, and think that I wish death upon third-world babies, I really don't. But I don't believe fairtrade is an effective way to help the situation. There are better methods.

I totally see where you are coming from with this, I took a course called World Issues in High School last year that dealt with topics like Fair Trade, and this never occurred to me. However, aren't most of them already growing coffee, or another cash crop? The environment already exists, its just giving a leg up to a few farmers. Really, Fair Trade should be forcing them to reinvest the extra money they earn on crops that could be locally sold, vs being shipped here, if Fair Trade is really concerned about sustainability.

Quid

Solvent wrote: »

Now, reduced to those basics, which as I'm said I'm given most often, (but yeah again it's a complex issue plenty more arguments for and against), fairtrade seems to ignore the fact that one of the reasons the price of coffee is so low is that there's so many suppliers worldwide. Huge, huge numbers of people growing coffee. There's so much out there, that we don't have to pay a high price because there's surplus stock we can basically buy up for cheap if someone tries to charge us more.
What will happen though if you then say, well this price isn't 'fair' to poor farmers, and try to pay people a higher price? If people can get more money for their produce than they did previously, then it's going to give them an incentive to grow more coffee. It's going to give other people who aren't growing coffee an incentive to begin growing coffee once they see these fairtrade-supported farmers making an above-market return on their investment.
So basically, it's good for a little while that poorer farmers get more money, but then it creates an environment where more coffee is grown. And so you add higher supply to already high supply, and that just creates greater pressure on the price of coffee to drop even further. What do we do with the excess coffee? Go drop it off a boat into the Indian ocean I suppose.

Um, you are aware that Fair Trade applies to more than just coffee, right?

TheCrumblyCracker

Quid wrote: »

Solvent wrote: »

Now, reduced to those basics, which as I'm said I'm given most often, (but yeah again it's a complex issue plenty more arguments for and against), fairtrade seems to ignore the fact that one of the reasons the price of coffee is so low is that there's so many suppliers worldwide. Huge, huge numbers of people growing coffee. There's so much out there, that we don't have to pay a high price because there's surplus stock we can basically buy up for cheap if someone tries to charge us more.
What will happen though if you then say, well this price isn't 'fair' to poor farmers, and try to pay people a higher price? If people can get more money for their produce than they did previously, then it's going to give them an incentive to grow more coffee. It's going to give other people who aren't growing coffee an incentive to begin growing coffee once they see these fairtrade-supported farmers making an above-market return on their investment.
So basically, it's good for a little while that poorer farmers get more money, but then it creates an environment where more coffee is grown. And so you add higher supply to already high supply, and that just creates greater pressure on the price of coffee to drop even further. What do we do with the excess coffee? Go drop it off a boat into the Indian ocean I suppose.

Um, you are aware that Fair Trade applies to more than just coffee, right?

I would say its fair to say that the majority of the crops covered by Fair Trade are going to be cash crops.

http://www.fairtrade.org.uk/products/retail_products/default.aspx

Cocoa, Sugar, Cotton, and tropical fruits.

Quid

Yes, well, perhaps they'll start growing corn when we stop giving farmers billions to undercut them.

Also, tropical fruit =/= cash crop.

TheCrumblyCracker

Quid wrote: »

Yes, well, perhaps they'll start growing corn when we stop giving farmers billions to undercut them.

Also, tropical fruit =/= cash crop.

So there isn't a have a market for Tropical Fruit North of the Equator? When is the last time you were in a super market?
Edit'd in the geography

Quid

It's not a cash crop because of where it's grown. Or do you think there is some fundamental difference between an apple and a banana that makes the latter a cash crop?

TheCrumblyCracker

http://www.philtourism.gov.ph/bigimages/rmp_pineapple.jpg

Dude must love eating Pineapples.

Quid

/facepalm

A cash crop is a crop grown for money. It is not based on whether or not it's difficult to get in your particular area. What, exactly, do you think people living in tropical areas should grow?

TheCrumblyCracker

Maybe we have differences in our definitions of cash crop? I see it as a commodity that is grown to be exported, by and large, to foreign locations for money, versus growing local for a local market. What would make the apple or banana a cash crop? Depends on where that banana is heading.

One of my friend's fathers owns an apple farm that has been in their family for the last N years, they sell to the local food markets, bring the apples to the Farmer's Market. Is that a cash crop? I don't think so.

If the apples were destined for New York? Then yes.

Edit: REALLY LATE EDIT, wasn't new post worthy.

A cash crop is a crop grown for money.

What isn't a cash crop then?

ege02

Solvent wrote: »

Now, reduced to those basics, which as I'm said I'm given most often, (but yeah again it's a complex issue plenty more arguments for and against), fairtrade seems to ignore the fact that one of the reasons the price of coffee is so low is that there's so many suppliers worldwide. Huge, huge numbers of people growing coffee. There's so much out there, that we don't have to pay a high price because there's surplus stock we can basically buy up for cheap if someone tries to charge us more.
What will happen though if you then say, well this price isn't 'fair' to poor farmers, and try to pay people a higher price? If people can get more money for their produce than they did previously, then it's going to give them an incentive to grow more coffee. It's going to give other people who aren't growing coffee an incentive to begin growing coffee once they see these fairtrade-supported farmers making an above-market return on their investment.
So basically, it's good for a little while that poorer farmers get more money, but then it creates an environment where more coffee is grown. And so you add higher supply to already high supply, and that just creates greater pressure on the price of coffee to drop even further. What do we do with the excess coffee? Go drop it off a boat into the Indian ocean I suppose.

This is true.

wikipedia wrote:

Criticism: Fair trade opponents such as the Adam Smith Institute claim that similar to other farm subsidies, fair trade attempts to set a price floor for a good that is in many cases above the market price and therefore encourages, as fair trade opponents claim, existing producers to produce more and new producers to enter the market, leading to excess supply.[29] Through the laws of supply and demand, excess supply can lead to lower prices in the non-Fair Trade market.[30]

In 2003, Cato Institute's vice president for research Brink Lindsey referred to fair trade as a “well intentioned, interventionist scheme...doomed to end in failure." Fair trade, according to Lindsey, is a misguided attempt to make up for market failures in which one flawed pricing structure is replaced with another.[31]Lindsey's comments echo the main criticisms of Fair Trade, claiming that it "leads fair trade producers to increase production." While benefiting a number of Fair Trade producers over the short run, fair trade critics worry about the impact on long run development and economic growth. Economic theory suggests that when prices are low due to surplus production, adding a subsidy or otherwise artificially raising prices will only exacerbate the problem by encouraging more supply[32] and also encouraging workers into unproductive activities. [33]

Response: The Fairtrade Foundation counters the price distortion argument by claiming that fair trade does not ‘fix prices’. "It rather has a minimum floor price that ensures farmers can meet the costs of sustainable production should market prices fall below this level. The minimum price is not a fixed price but the starting point for a market-based price negotiation. Many fair trade growers routinely earn more than this for the quality, type of coffee bean (or other product) or the particular origin they offer. The minimum price mechanism provides the most vulnerable people in the supply chain the security to meet their basic costs in time of crisis. Effectively, it provides a safety net should markets fall below a level considered necessary for farmers to earn back the costs of sustainable production".[34]

Moreoever, the fair trade minimum price only applies if the market price is lower than this. When market prices exceed the minimum price, traders must negotiate on the basis of market prices, not fair trade minimums.[35]

Several academics, including Hayes[36], Becchetti and Rosati[37], also identify two other counterarguments to this criticism.

1. First, in many cases the exchange between producers and intermediaries does not occur in a competitive framework.[37] In such case the market price is a distortion because it does not reflect the productivity of producers but their lower market power.[38]
2. Second, the price distortion argument does not take into account the principles of product differentiation. Coffee, for example, cannot be compared to other commodities such as oil: there is not one single type of coffee but instead many different brands that are differentiated from one another in terms of quality, blends, packaging, and now also "social responsibility" features. Consumer demand and taste define what different market prices are acceptable for each of these products.[37] In this sense, fair trade can be considered as a market-driven innovation in the food industry that creates a new range of products for which a growing segment of consumers are willing to pay more based on environmental and social responsibility claims.[37]

And finally, beyond these elements, it is also important to also take into account all the other non-price related potential benefits of the fair trade value chain in terms of technical assistance, democratization of markets through increasing consumer power, crop diversification programs, etc.[37]

Personally I haven't made up my mind on it. Both sides have good points; I agree that fair trade is basically a production-side subsidy, and I don't like those for a variety of reasons (they fuck up the environment and producers in foreign markets, and they are a disincentive for market efficiency). On the other hand, the economics of more complicated products such as coffee cannot be explained by the simple "olol supply and demand" model, because there are a lot of complex market forces and various other considerations that enter the equation.

Quid

TheCrumblyCracker wrote: »

Maybe we have differences in our definitions of cash crop? I see it as a commodity that is grown to be exported, by and large, to foreign locations for money, versus growing local for a local market. What would make the apple or banana a cash crop? Depends on where that banana is heading.

One of my friend's fathers owns an apple farm that has been in their family for the last N years, they sell to the local food markets, bring the apples to the Farmer's Market. Is that a cash crop? I don't think so.

If the apples were destined for New York? Then yes.

Edit: REALLY LATE EDIT, wasn't new post worthy.

A cash crop is a crop grown for money.

What isn't a cash crop then?

A crop that is used to feed one's livestock and family. While it's fun to make up definitions for words, that's the real one. More importantly though, the crops America grows are heavily subsidized and exported to countries where the people would more than likely grow their own food if American farmers weren't able to completely undercut them.

@Ege: I agree that subsidies are a bad way to solve the problem. However, until we can stop our own screwed up system of throwing money at corn farmers it's the best I can see.

dlinfiniti

dayy-oo ddayyyy-ooo

electricitylikesme

Since we're onto the more general topic of farm subsidies, here's something that's been bothering me: Why is it a bad thing that biofuels are driving the price of food up?

I mean, in every single documentary on a poverty-stricken region that I've ever seen, the problem with free-trade is that American surplus grain and other foods immediately bankrupts every farmer in the area, but then no one has any money to produce anything else to buy food in the first place.

Ergo, isn't biofuels driving up the worldwide price of food (and cutting production in the worst offender countries like America) actually an incredibly good thing in the fight against worldwide poverty, since farmers in these countries will finally be able to grow a crop they can sell globally and which will be bought because America won't just be drowning them in subsidized way below market food?

TheCrumblyCracker

Quid wrote: »

TheCrumblyCracker wrote: »

Maybe we have differences in our definitions of cash crop? I see it as a commodity that is grown to be exported, by and large, to foreign locations for money, versus growing local for a local market. What would make the apple or banana a cash crop? Depends on where that banana is heading.

One of my friend's fathers owns an apple farm that has been in their family for the last N years, they sell to the local food markets, bring the apples to the Farmer's Market. Is that a cash crop? I don't think so.

If the apples were destined for New York? Then yes.

Edit: REALLY LATE EDIT, wasn't new post worthy.

A cash crop is a crop grown for money.

What isn't a cash crop then?

A crop that is used to feed one's livestock and family.

I cut out most of the crap that involved you insulting me and dumping.

Sustenance Farming? And then sending excess food to local markets? Yea. Good thing we brought Capitalism to South America.

Monoculture crops, cash crops, whatever you want to call it. That's what is going on in these countries. It's fucking up sustainability. Plus subsidies, which increase the problem.

Edit: Subsidiesolol
Speaking of subsidies, I am sure most of you have seen this by now, but hey.

EU Cares more about their cattle then 140 Million people.
http://www.nytimes.com/2005/10/27/opinion/27thur1.html

Incenjucar

I would generally just prefer that companies with human rights violations tied to their product lines should be fined until it is no longer profitable for them to be evil.

Kessa

The American corn subsidy is an issue that bothers me. I haven't studied it in any depth, but I am an economics major, so certain topics come up occasionally, so you could say I'm acquainted with the issues. I learned long ago that there was a corn subsidy that ended in huge portions of crops being destroyed. Then earlier this year I learned that demand for corn to produce inefficient ethanol was pushing up corn prices, and therefor, other food prices (like beef and chicken, which are fed corn products). Are we still destroying the "excess" corn? And why the hell do corn producers still receive the subsidy? Again, not actually having looked it up, I don't know if this already happens, but there should be threshold market prices at which subsidies are temporarily removed, and reinstated when prices dip below the threshold. I bet I could make an excel document that could do it (or my husband could at the very least), if Congress and the lobbyists are worried about it being too hard to install and update.

Incenjucar

The thing with food subsidies is that you have to ensure that the entire population can afford food regardless of the proper price of food.

The thing is that products are globalized, and a subsidy in one country allows for price gouging in other countries, so that local markets that can't afford subsidies can't compete.

Quid

TheCrumblyCracker wrote: »

Sustenance Farming? And then sending excess food to local markets? Yea. Good thing we brought Capitalism to South America.

Monoculture crops, cash crops, whatever you want to call it. That's what is going on in these countries. It's fucking up sustainability. Plus subsidies, which increase the problem.

Ah, well then. Clearly I should stop helping poor farmers try to compete with America's farmers. Brilliant work sir. From now on it's only American goods and third world countries can be glad to live off whatever we send them.

I mean, you do realize I'm against subsidies on the whole and only approve of this one because it's currently the only way to help them against American subsidies, right? Because if you think that's a terrible temporary solution please demonstrate what you're doing to help.

ege02

Incenjucar wrote: »

I would generally just prefer that companies with human rights violations tied to their product lines should be fined until it is no longer profitable for them to be evil.

This is a noble idea in theory, but it would be horrible in practice.

For one thing, I don't think it would be very effective, because I don't think it would lead to a decrease in cheap labor exploitation. It would just be an incentive for companies to hide their crimes better, probably through even harsher treatment of their workers. It would also be an incentive to escape punishment with the use of bribery and "lobbying." The fact is, fines work only when the crime is easy to detect and the perpetrators are somewhat easy to convict and punish. Otherwise they're just an incredibly inefficient means of enforcement.

For another thing, it would fuck everyone over. Once you start fining corporations for exploiting cheap labor, you'd essentially be taking away their only chance at competing with the emerging Asian markets. This would be a massive blow to the already struggling US economy and it would reduce the standard of living for everyone, especially the poor, who would no longer have the ability to afford a wide range of goods.

I'm against human rights violations. I'm also in favor of economic efficiency. It is somewhat fucked up that the system perpetuates the former while requiring the latter, but there's no need to fuck it up even more.

ege02

Quid wrote: »

I mean, you do realize I'm against subsidies on the whole and only approve of this one because it's currently the only way to help them against American subsidies, right?

Fighting a subsidy with a subsidy is an awful thing to do on so many levels.. you're essentially promoting over-production on both sides rather than on just one side. It's not a solution. It's just another problem that we're supporting because we're so fucking noble... and nobly short-sighted too.

Incenjucar

Thing is, Ege, I'm pretty sure the average American hobo has it better than the average child plantation slave.

We have a bit of room to give in that direction.

As for competing with China and India, that's a cultural issue that's even harder to solve, because money isn't nearly as much of a factor as willingness to infect other cultures in a more direct fashion.

Quid

ege02 wrote: »

Quid wrote: »

I mean, you do realize I'm against subsidies on the whole and only approve of this one because it's currently the only way to help them against American subsidies, right?

Fighting a subsidy with a subsidy is an awful thing to do on so many levels.. you're essentially promoting over-production on both sides rather than on just one side. It's not a solution. It's just another problem that we're supporting because we're so fucking noble... and nobly short-sighted too.

When the solution isn't available at the time it is the best measure available to me. I know full well it's not the best solution, but it is the best available solution right now.

Fallingman

There's a few times in my life that I've heard of the dickery of certain companies - and I'll never buy their products again.

Nestle and their 3rd world baby formula shenannigans
The ford Pinto debacle (think 'fight club' - the formula)

I know that "one man wont put a dent in their earnings" blah blah... But I wont have any part of their business. It makes me feel better.

SanderJK

The chocolate slavery thing is one of the more underreported things in the world...just about all chocolate in the world is made with slavery. (Talking real slavery too, actual villages being raided for workers who are slowly starved to death because getting new ones is cheaper then feeding them properly).

When a dutch TV reporter found out about this, he bought a bar on tape and then went to the police station to get himself arrested for knowingly aiding slavery. His case got thrown out eventually, so he began making "slavefree" chocolate. This caused him to be sued by a major chocolate maker (Bellissimo) for defaming their product. Here's a subtitled clip of his antics.

I guess it's just another way the world is fucked up at the moment.

poshniallo

I think Fair Trade is economically efficient but has a positive effect on the producers.

But, as the Mars Trilogy reminded me, economic efficiency is not the primary goal of humanity.

TheCrumblyCracker

Quid wrote: »

Ah, well then. Clearly I should stop helping poor farmers try to compete with America's farmers. Brilliant work sir. From now on it's only American goods and third world countries can be glad to live off whatever we send them.

I mean, you do realize I'm against subsidies on the whole and only approve of this one because it's currently the only way to help them against American subsidies, right? Because if you think that's a terrible temporary solution please demonstrate what you're doing to help.

Want a permanent solution? Lets cut off the aid. Foreign Aid is like stocking fish in a lake every year. It's not sustainable, and its going to continue until the end of time, unless you allow the fish to spawn. Sure, they are going to take a population dive at first, but they will come back eventually. Sure, thousands, maybe millions(?) may die, but it will be better for sustainability in the long run.

How the hell did you get that I LIKE Farm subsidies? Cow's in the EU make more then a cocoa farmer, how can anybody agree with that? Farm subsidies in the rich nations were having a negative impact on sustainability of poor farmers in the third world, by forcing them to grow cash crop. Did you even take a look at the link that was in my post?