Rainforest Alliance vs Fairtrade
From Hooked - Students for Trade Justice
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This is a short document published by Rainforest Alliance. It provides an overview of the work of Rainforest Alliance with small coffee farmers and discusses briefly the benefits of improved coffee quality; improved environmental conditions; of commanding a higher prices with Rainforest Alliance certification; as well as investments in social and environmental programs financed by the RA premium.
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USFT, based in the United States, is a national network of student organizations advocating around Fair Trade products, policies, and principles. This is their policy on RA v FT.
This is an article discussing the issues of RA vs Fairtrade published in the Guardian on Nov 24 2004.
In 2005, Fairtrade Flinders (the Fairtrade student club at Flinders University in South Australia) ran a campaign to get Fairtrade coffee available on campus. (email: fairtradeflinders@yahoo.com.au). As a part of this, Fairtrade Flinders compiled a 'Fairtrade Procurement Policy' document to present to their Student Union. The Rainforest Alliance vs Fairtrade debate had become quite central to the question of switching to Fairtrade at Flinders Uni. This document, excerpted from the procurement policy document, is the response to this debate offered by Fairtrade Flinders.
Another article is on Fairtrade and Rainforest Alliance Certification of coffee.
Detailed report from the International Institute for Sustainable Development (IISD) on the issues involved with the Environmental and Other Labelling of coffee.
