A – Z Guide to a Fair Trade Christmas – F is for Friendship

F is for Friendship and our Friendship Bowl makes an ideal Christmas present for someone you are close to. Outstretched arms envelop this lovely polished alluminun bowl, perfect for sharing fruit or treats

The bowl is made by Noah’s Ark in India. Noah's Ark was established to provide welfare and better living conditions for very poor artisans in the villages of Moradabad, India. Besides fair wages and business support, Noah's Ark provides life insurance, medical and a facility for child education. Through their profits, they are building a school to provide free education to the children who work in the fields of Moradabad. Noah's Ark is also associated with Indian Society of Deaf and Indian Every Home Crusade. Noah’s Ark has recently joined IFAT, the International Fair Trade Association, and currently, over 90% of their sales are to IFAT members. Noah’s Handicrafts and Welfare Society provides free nutrition, medical services and basic education for artisans and their families. Thirty-five artisan groups, representing 280 full-time artisans are working with Noah’s Ark.

Noah’s Ark seeks to enable artisan groups to become established enough to purchase their own machinery and raw materials. These groups can then continue to market and export their handicrafts through Noah’s Ark. As the businesses become more self-sufficient, Noah’s Ark takes on new families. Since their inception, about 20 workshops have become independent.

These bowls always selll out quickly and are available to purchase online.

A – Z Guide to a Fair Trade Christmas – E is for EMA

EMA or the Equitable Marketing Organisation is based in Kolkata in India. EMA has been trading fairly for over 30 years. Production takes place at a Development Centre on the outskirts of Kolkata, where almost 200 artisans work, 30 of whom are disabled. The artisans are provided with food and lodging and work in a safe environment from Tuesday to Saturday. They make our leather document wallets which are available in black and red.

The 'shanti' or goat leather comes from Chennai in India. When EMA receives the raw material it is examined thoroughly for its thickness, smoothness and most importantly for tick marks. The leather is then cut, the design embossed, painted, glazed, stitched, lined and lacquered to prevent fading by sunlight. The result is lovely soft leather which is beautifully finished.

The document bag, available in either black or red, is decorated with a 'holding hands' design. There is ample room to fit your A4 documents and folders and all the important features such as inside pockets and mobile phone pocket have thought of.

You can purchase them in our online store

Today in our A – Z Guide to a Fair Trade Christmas it is D for dinner.

Christmas dinner is a very important part of the family’s celebrations and wouldn’t it be nice to serve it on a fair trade table cloth?

Our Snowflake Table Linen Dining Set is hand-woven and gives you all the table linen you need for a seasonal spread. The full-size cotton tablecloth comes with 6 placemats and 6 napkins.

This table linen is made by The Tamilnadu Handloom Weavers Co-operative Society. Co-optex was established in 1935 and is a state government organisation which co-ordinates the work and sales of thousands of handloom weavers in Tamil Nadu. It ensures that the weavers receive a fair price for their work.

This might also make a nice gift and we deliver to Ireland, Britain and Worldwide.

It is C today in our A – Z Guide to a Fair Trade Christmas.

C is for Children and Child Labour. Over 158 million children aged 5-14 years are engaged in child labour in developing countries. (Source UNICEF). According to the United Nations, 126 million of them are occupied in the worst forms of labour affecting their health or education, e.g. in mines, with chemicals and pesticides in agriculture, or with dangerous machinery. Of these, 50 million work in Sub-Saharan Africa alone. There is an important distinction to be made between a child being forced into labour and a child's willing participation in work. Helping with the housework or in the family business, or earning pocket money during school holidays are all positive steps in a child's development. These forms of work provide children with valuable skills and experience. The work done by a child is not considered labour if it doesn't harm their health, interrupt their education or hinder their personal development.

Most of us are consumers of some products tainted by child labour. It could be the cotton in your table linen or clothes, chocolate with origins in the Ivory Coast, jewellery, hand-knotted carpets from India, your iPod, footballs from Pakistan, that cup of coffee in your local cafe....

If we do not care whether or not the products we purchase are made by child labour, governments will continue to avert their eyes from the plight of these children. So how are we to avoid the trap of benefiting from the labour of children? One answer to this problem is to buy fair trade products this Christmas.

Organizations accredited by the World Fair Trade Organisation who buy Fair Trade products from producer groups either directly or through intermediaries ensure that no forced labour is used in production and the producer complies with the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child, and national / local law on the employment of children.

The A – Z Guide to a Fair Trade Christmas - B is for Books

We are on to B in our A – Z Guide to a Fair Trade Christmas and B is for Books


B is for Books, in particular books for children, they make a great Christmas Gift and we have a lovely selection. Our books celebrate diversity . They introduce children to cultures and traditions from all over the world, encouraging them to see life from different perspectives.

Our favourite is called My Granny Went to Market. From Kenya to Mexico to Tokyo in one day you fly away with Granny and count with her from one to ten as she spins around the world on an unforgettable shopping trip. This colourful, rhyming story is followed by a counting page for reinforced learning. This book is suitable for children aged 3 to 7 years.

We have books for older children too and the old favourites like Pirates and Princesses are also there.

The A – Z Guide to a Fair Trade Christmas

Today, we are going to begin our A – Z Guide to a Fair Trade Christmas and we are going to kick off with A for Asha.

Asha Handicrafts who are based in Mumbai in India are a wonderful example of Fair Trade Organisation and produce a wonderful selection of goods suitable for Christmas Gifts. You can choose fair trade gifts such as a shopping bag for Mother made from camel leather or a carved spectacles holder for Dad. (The spectacles holder was a surprise best seller last year and we are adding another design in the next few days.)

Asha have been practicing Fair Trade since 1975, even before the concepts of Fair Trade became popular abroad. Asha in Sanskrit means 'hope' and Asha have brought hope by providing a marketing outlet to the individual craftsmen. Asha is an association of voluntary businessmen dedicated to helping craftsmen, financially, ecologically and spiritually though its welfare centre and interrelated programs. The team of Asha welfare workers are stationed at different producer groups and cooperatives and move closely with them and their family sharing skills, extending medical help and education. Technical training is also provided to increase efficiency and productivity to encourage the growth and development of cottage industries.

You can view our selection of products from Asha here.

Velvet Accessories to complete your Christmas Party Outfit

Velvet is certainly making a revival this year and will feature strongly on the Christmas Party scene. If the velvet dress is not for you but you would like to give a nod to the trend then simply take on velvet with a pair of gloves, a lovely soft scarf or a tactile handbag.


Our rich velvet handmade bags start at €23 and are available in Midnight Blue, Chocolate, Red and Grey/Green. We also have scarves to match, which will really complete an outfit. They also make an excellent Christmas Present.

A fair trade organization working with producers in Vietnam, as part of their poverty alleviation program, produce our beautiful fair trade velvet scarves and pom-pom bags. The organization comprises of more than 40 producer groups, most of who belong to ethnic minorities, some have disabilities believed to have been caused by the use of Agent Orange in the Vietnam War, teaching them the practices of fair trade and ensuring that they earn fair wages.

Please view in our online store for further information.

Handmade Christmas Cards that make a difference

We have some special Christmas Cards on sale in our online shop this year. It is disadvantaged women that benefit most from these enterprises which enable them to earn a sustainable living.

From the Philippines we have a set of three handmade paper cards hand-decorated with dried flowers, leaves, sequins, gems and metallic thread. The cards are made by Salay Handmade Paper Industries is a family-owned business that started in 1987 with the objective of providing a sustainable livelihood for the people in the local area. The business currently has three production sites housing the fair trade paper production, the fair trade craft workers and an admin/sales office. Several workers work from home on a piecework basis. There are over 200 employees, the majority women.

We have a set of four cards is made entirely by hand, and that includes the paper, by skilled Nepali crafts people in the heart of the Himalayas. The craftspeople, most of whom are female, are employed by GPI, a company set up in 1984 with a loan from the World Bank. Originally, it made paper from lokta for the local market. In 1988 it began trading with Body Shop and its market was exclusively exported for some years. It also began using more environmentally-friendly raw materials (waste cotton from garment factories and waste paper from local businesses), because lokta use was linked to deforestation. Employees have grown from about 20 to over 100 (80% women), all in permanent jobs. Products are made from a variety of raw materials including cotton rags, waste paper along with banana tree stems, water hyacinth and jute.

We have another set of four cards, this time from Bangladesh, and they are also handmade. They are made by Eastern Screen Printers who are part of Prokritee. Prokritee has been working in Bangladesh since 1972, starting and operating small cottage industries in rural areas around the country. These include Action Bag and Eastern Screen Printers. There are about 700 people (about 95% are women) who are involved in making a variety of handicrafts and they strive to develop unique products.

The name 'Prokritee' means 'nature' in Bangla. The organisation aims to create employment for disadvantaged rural women. It tends to work with women who are head of their household (often widowed), and who are landless, with few or no assets. It sets up and runs cottage industries in rural areas as well as providing marketing and design assistance to 9 enterprises. The aim is that the groups become strong enough to become independent of Prokritee.

You can buy your Christmas Cards here: http://www.arushafairtrade.com/21-christmas-cards