Happy Christmas Fairtrade Leigh-on-Sea Supporters

Workers from Satemwa Tea Estate and tea farmers from Msuwadzi Association, and their families wish you Mafuno Abwino, 'Season's Greetings' in the Malawian language Chichewa.



Thank you for all your support in 2011 - see you in 2012.

New 2011/12 Southend-on-Sea Fairtrade Directory distributors wanted

We've just been working on the content & listings for the new 2011/12 Southend-on-Sea Fairtrade Directory. Thanks to http://www.adlocreative.com/  and http://www.faragherjones.com/  for their help with design, content & layout. Let us know if you can take some to distibute in your shop, cafe, restaurant, school, salon, library, business, place of worship etc. We need to get them far & wide when they are back from the printers.

Making Your Meal Fairtrade: Belfairs High School Cookery Competition Winner Announced

Belfairs High School Fairtrade Cookery Competition is now in it's 5th year! The idea is to cook a delicious dish using Fairtrade ingredients. Good for our tummy's and good for the producers in the developing world. Yum yum.

This year the competition was judged by two leading local chefs - Matthew and Lee from Sandbank Restaurant, London Road, Leigh-on-Sea. The judging that took place on 1st March during Fairtrade Fortnight was tough, there were lots of entries and the standard was very high.

However in the end the prestigious first prize was awarded to Georgina Lee with her Fairtrade Green Banana Curry

Well done Georgina and well done Belfairs High School for you continued work in highlighting Fairtrade.

PRESS RELEASE: Heycroft Primary School Awarded Official Fairtrade School Status

Fairtrade Schools: Commitees from Heycroft Primary School and Southend High School for Boys

Heycroft School in Eastwood has become the first Southend Primary School to be awarded Fairtrade Status. The award is given to schools who show an ongoing commitment to using and promoting Fairtrade products over a period of time. The school’s Fairtrade committee consisting of pupils, governors and staff have organised and led a number of special events over the past 18 months including raffles, sales, competitions and a Fairtrade Family Breakfast. Children across the school have also been learning about Fairtrade in class and have had visitors to the school from the charity Actionaid and a farmer from Uganda to speak to the children in assemblies.

Heycroft recently met up with the Fairtrade committee from Southend High School Boys to share ideas for the future. The pupils from SHSB shared their research on Fairtrade footballs and sports equipment. They also looked at Fairtrade clothing and are planning a fashion show in the near future.

Headteacher Andrew Palmer said: “The children have been fully engaged with the principles of Fairtrade and have become fantastic ambassadors for this very important organisation which ensures workers receive a fair wage for the work they do. I am delighted that year 6 pupils who are going to SHSB will be carrying on their good work.”

Leigh-on-Sea Fairtrade Town coordinator, David Elcock said: "As a Fairtrade Borough, we congratulate Heycroft on their excellent work and would encourage other local schools to become involved".

ENDS

For more information
Andrew Palmer Headteacher, Heycroft Primary School 01702 521832
http://www.fairtradeleigh.org.uk/

Fairtrade Fortnight (or any time!) – Chocolate & Banana Muffins

We can't remember if we blogged, tweeted or facebooked this fantastic recipe for Fairtrade Chocolate and Banana Muffins back in Fairtrade Fortnight. Hey, but why just reserve this fantastic recipe for Fairtrade Fortnight only?

Why not give making these delicious little beauties a try - as devised by Leigh-on-Sea based food blogger Victoria C over at http://www.ilovemealplans.com/

Thanks for the yummy excuse Victoria.

Fairtrade Churches Newsletter April 2011

Thanks for getting loud and proud about Fairtrade!

A huge thank you to all those who took part in Fairtrade Fortnight 2011. We hope you and your church enjoyed it as much as we did! 

We would love to hear about any interesting, fun or innovative events or activities that your church community was involved in. Please send a short report and plenty of pictures to Jennifer.williams@fairtrade.org.uk and your event could even appear on our website!

It would also be great if you could take two minutes to complete our survey about what you thought of the theme, materials and resources provided for Fairtrade Fortnight this year and what you think we could do to make Fortnight even better in the future. 

Putting Jesus back into Easter

Of the incredible 80 million Easter eggs sold each year, the Real Easter Egg is the first and only Fairtrade chocolate Easter Egg to explain the Christian understanding of Easter on the box. As well as producers receiving the Fairtrade premium to invest in projects of their choice, a donation from each of these eggs sold goes to fund charity and development projects in the UK and overseas.

A church-backed campaign has succeeded in convincing Morrison’s, Waitrose, Co-op and Booths to stock a limited trial amount of the eggs this Easter! So, if you would like to buy one, just pop along to your local supermarket or use the Real Easter Egg hunter to find your nearest independent retailer stocking the egg

Take action for Christian Aid Week

Christian Aid Week takes place from 15 - 21 May and this year focuses on their partner organisation Sopexxca in – a Fairtrade producer group.
If you fancy organising an event in your local area, taking part in a fundraising activity or perhaps producing a Christian Aid Week order of service, you can find all the resources you need to make the most of the week here.

And, if you really want to challenge yourself, why not sign up to take part in Live Below the Line from 2 - 6 May and see if you can live on just £1 per day for five days whilst raising awareness and money to help some of the world's poorest people.

Fairtrade Fortnight producer tour

Have a read of our blog from the producer tour across the UK during Fairtrade Fortnight 2011... click here

Fairtrade and the local elections
Find out from the people who want to represent you, what their commitment is to Fairtrade.Download a local election campaign guide here.

Transform lives this Lent
Join CAFOD’s campaign calling on the UK government to get down to business for the world's poorest people.Take action here

If you can’t view this article properly please click here

Can you help sew together the final, record breaking line of cotton bunting for trade justice?

We know many of you have already got people painting, drawing and stitching their support onto bunting triangles and thank you. Next step is to sew all those beautiful triangles together to create a record breaking show of support for trade justice ….

 

Bunting for justice

 

For Fairtrade Fortnight 2011 the Fairtrade Foundation had a big focus on cotton as part of The Great Cotton Stitch-Up – our campaign calling on the EU to scrap its cotton subsidies. Cotton is the most used natural fibre in the world and should be the ‘white gold’ that propels ten million West African farmers out of poverty. But the West African cotton industry is obstructed by a wall of subsidies paid by the United States and European Union to their farmers. Combined, the US and EU have spent $32bn on their cotton farmers over the past nine years. The result is to dampen down cotton prices for West Africa farmers, with devastating effects. Read more here: http://www.fairtrade.org.uk/products/cotton/the_great_cotton_stitch_up.aspx

 

To draw attention to this issue, we invited our supporters to get involved in Bunting for Justice, ordering packs of Fairtrade cotton bunting triangles to decorate with Fairtrade and trade justice messages and return to us to be sewn together into a Guinness World Record breaking line of bunting. Thousands of people took part and we have been overwhelmed with the response – sack loads of beautifully decorated bunting are piling up in our offices and we are in the process of sorting through it to be sewn together.

 

We need your help!

 

This job is a lot bigger than we were expecting, and we really need volunteers to help with a number of tasks, including sorting the bunting flags, recording the senders and help with sewing the bunting lines (we have a room set up in our office with industrial sewing machines and all the equipment). We have 4 weeks to make this happen and we are confident we can do it, but the more pairs of hands we have to help, especially those with sewing experience, the longer our bunting will be!

 

If you can help, we would ask you to commit a minimum of half a day, we will pay travel expenses (and lunch in the form of vouchers if you can stay all day), and ply you with cups of tea and biscuits! The assembly of the bunting is taking place at our offices in Aldgate – details here: http://www.fairtrade.org.uk/contact_us.aspx over the next 4 weeks. We hope to be doing this on weekend and bank holidays too, depending on peoples’ availability. The bunting will be displayed on World Fair Trade Day – Saturday 14 May, so our deadline is Thursday 12 May.

 

Please email action@fairtrade.org.uk with your details and time and dates you can commit.

 

Many thanks and all the best

 

Hannah

Hannah Reed
Campaigns Manager (Fairtrade Towns)