News & Events
Thomas: Chocolate seller with a mission is a Live 1
The Commercial Appeal - 7/3/2005
By Wendi C. Thomas
What Saturday's Live 8 concerts drew attention to, what this week's G8 summit in Scotland hopes to achieve, Memphis businessman Dan Petchers is already doing, albeit on a smaller scale.
Both the concerts and the gathering of the world's richest eight nations want to erase poverty in Africa. To do so, fair trade systems must be created, Live 8 organizers and G8 leaders agree.
Fair trade means that farmers and artisans in developing nations receive a price for their products that allows them to make a living and send their children to school, instead of to work in the fields.
This is where Petchers, who owns Best Fundraisers, comes in. For the past two years, he's offered the fair trade candy bar Divine Chocolate to local groups as a fund-raiser.
The fund-raising groups keep 50 percent of the bar's $2 price. A good portion of the rest goes back to the Kuapa Kokoo co-op of Ghanaian farmers who grow the cocoa beans that make the chocolate; they also own part of the company.
Fair trade standards, he says, mean that for the first time, these farmers can afford to taste the chocolate they help make.
Petchers learned about the fair trade movement from his son, Seth, 32, who works for Oxfam America, a nonprofit organization determined to solve the problems that cause poverty worldwide.
"At the very basic level, this is about people wanting to take care of their families, just like you," explains Seth.
The challenge is in opening the eyes of bargain lovers who never consider how little money goes to the people who create the products we buy.
The goal of father and son is to spread the word about those products, particularly commodities like chocolate, coffee, bananas and sugar, that provide a fair wage to everyone on the supply chain.
Fair trade is "a business model and not a charity model," Seth says. The "Fair Trade Certified" logo on a chocolate bar is no different than the Intel logo on a computer. Buyers are willing to pay for what they value, be it Intel technology, or fair trade products.
While some fair trade products do cost more than comparable ones, most are competitively priced. For example, Starbucks' fair trade coffee sells for about $11 per pound. Their cheapest coffee is $10 per pound; the most expensive for more than $22 per pound.
It's estimated that fair trade products are just .01 percent of the $3.6 trillion of goods exchanged globally.
According to the Fair Trade Federation, a Haitian woman who makes clothes sold in the U.S. might earn less than 1 percent of what the clothing sells for. Fair trade operations return between 25 and 33 percent of the profits back to farmers and workers in developing nations.
That difference, often measured in pennies, Seth says, often determines whether the farmer and his family survives.
It might not be justice for African farmers and their children, but whatever issue moves you to act, you'll find in the fair trade movement.
If the fear of another 9/11 attack keeps you up at nights, know that establishing fair trade systems creates stable economies that are less likely to harbor terrorists.
If you chant "Just Say No" to drugs, remember that a coffee co-op in Colombia made sure fields were used to grow coffee beans, and not poppy plants.
Perhaps you're staunchly for women's rights. If so, you may be persuaded to seek out fair trade products (try Wild Oats) because you've learned that fair trade standards include making sure women are included in the decision-making processes.
And fair trade products are almost always grown organically, with an eye toward protecting biodiversity and sustaining the land.
With all that in mind, Dan Petchers isn't too bothered that he's not making much profit on Divine Chocolates.
"I have a mission here," he says. "If you could wind the clock five years ahead, fair trade products will mean something to consumers. This is the beginning."
For more information about fair trade, visit transfairusa.org. For information about Divine Chocolate, go to www.divinechocolate.com or contact Dan Petchers at 818-3818 or bestfundraisers.biz.
To contact Wendi C. Thomas, call (901) 529-5896 or send an e-mail.
