World Fair Trade Day 2012

On and around World Fair Trade Day on May 12th we will ask campaigners to get involved by having breakfasts made with ingredients from Fair Trade Organisations (FTOs) in order to celebrate the important contribution these unique groups make to trade justice. Breakfast activities can include:

• Starting at home by having a Fairtrade breakfast with family
• Organising a public breakfast on the high street, e.g. aim for the longest public breakfast table
• School breakfast clubs featuring FTO ingredients and products
• Church breakfasts before a Sunday service
• For more information visit: www.wftday.com
• For Fairtrade breakfast recipes visit: http://step.fairtrade.org.uk/worldfairtradeday

Email your photos of any World Fair Trade Day activities to rachel.norman@shared-interest.com and we will publish the best ones in the next newsletter.

Join Us

We are holding a Shared Interest Members meet up event in Edinburgh on the 11th May to tie in with World Fair Trade Day. This event is open to Members and their guests. It’s being held at the Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh and runs between 10.15am and 1pm. This is a free event but if you do want to come along then please register as places are limited. The deadline for registration is the 27th April. To find out more information and to register please click here.

Call to Action in London

To continue celebrations for the International Year of Co-operatives and to mark World Fair Trade Day, the Co-operative is holding a regional Members day in London on Saturday the 12th May 2012.  Shared Interest has been invited to take a stall in their marketplace and we are looking for Ambassadors to run it.  The event is at Fairfields Market in Croydon and starts at 10am. Please get in touch if you are interested.

Call to Action in Warwick

The Midcounties Cooperative is hosting a Co-operative Day in Warwick on the 27th May.  It will be an opportunity for everyone to engage with a wider audience and promote their work.

The event will take place in a park near to Warwick Technology Park with stalls, food, a BBQ, games and much more. If you are interested in going along to this event in behalf of Shared Interest please get in touch and we can book you a slot.

Volunteers’ Week!

The first week in June marks Volunteers’ Week; an annual nationwide celebration of the great contribution that volunteers make to organisations like ours.

This year we are inviting you to join us for a celebratory high tea.  We will be holding our first high tea in central London on the 2nd June, followed by another at the Newcastle Office on the 11th June. We would love you to join us and are happy to cover travel costs to your nearest tea party.

To give us an indication of how many people would like to attend could you please email Rachel and state your preference area as either North or South. For those of you in the Midlands, feel free to choose the party nearest you. Deadline to register is Friday 4th May.

A training event will also take place before the London tea party on 2nd June. This will be a morning session for new volunteers.  If you would like to take part, please let Rachel know; the same deadline applies.

AGM – Biggest ever!

The 22nd Annual General Meeting and Members Day was held at Oxford Town Hall on the 16th March and proved to be the largest attendance ever, with over 180 Members. Feedback was very positive with highlights for attendees including meeting likeminded people, talking to the overseas team, and hearing first-hand the massive impact their investment has made.

Volunteer Manager Rachel Norman with Ambassadors at the AGM

Our Keynote Speakers

Keynote speakers Ian Barney, Managing Director of Twin and Willington Wamayeye, MD of Gumutindo Coffee Cooperative gave the introductory address. Twin is a pioneer and leader of the fair trade movement. It is a membership organisation owned and guided by its producer groups in Africa, Latin America and Asia. Twin works on the ground with over 50 democratic farmer organisations in 18 countries representing some 400,000 smallholder farmers including Gumutindo Coffee Co-operative made up of around 6,000 farmers in the region of Mbale, Uganda.  Willington then followed with a very moving account of the difficulties created by climate change and the devastating impact of landslides in the small organic coffee farming community of Mount Elgon in Uganda.

Worldwide Impact of Fairtrade

It was reported that estimated retail sales of Fairtrade products in 2011 reached £1.32bn; a 12% increase on sales of £1.17bn in 2010. Cocoa and sugar have all seen significant growth with increases of 34% and 21% respectively during the same period. Bananas, coffee, tea are all showing steady growth. Critically, this means that Fairtrade premiums - the extra that producers receive for business or social development - increased by over 10% in 2011 compared with 2010.

The total Fairtrade premium totalled €51.5 million in 2010, of which 40% was invested back into the local businesses, 14% in the communities and 8% into local education.  Overall 1.2 million people are employed in Fairtrade around the world.

Shared Interest Achievements

We shared with Members how it has been an encouraging year for Shared Interest despite the economic climate.  Our Membership remains loyal and committed and investment continues to rise.

Patricia Alexander, MD, gave a brief summary of the main accomplishments:

• Approval of the new office in Ghana
• Comic Relief Social Investment Fund Pilot
• Introduction of a new vision statement “A WORLD WHERE JUSTICE IS AT THE HEART OF TRADE FINANCE”
• Introduction of new marketing materials to attract new Members
• Successful audit tender
• Successful bank tender
• VAT registration
• Continued commitment from Ambassadors and volunteers

Overall, payments of over £39m were made to 63 countries around the globe and 2010-11 saw the introduction of lending to a wider product range including marula nuts, vanilla and quinoa.

Report from the Secretary

• Rates charged to customers and average lending (66%) across the year similar to previous year
• Interest earned on deposits has increased by £120k to £635k
• Cost of money borrowed very similar to last year (£119k)
• Bad debt cost substantial and again includes a mixture of write-offs and specific provisions, totalling £670k
• Operating costs down almost 4% (again) – mostly personnel and marketing investment
• Result is a small surplus which takes us to reserves of £1.5m (about 5.4% of the share capital balance)
• All resolutions were carried with significant majority
  • Financial accounts
  • Social accounts
  • Pay arrangements Exec Directors
  • Re-appoint Auditor PWC
  • Election of Pauline Cameron and Peter Freeman onto the Board of Directors
  • Election for non-contested Members Sue Cotterell and Claire Wigg to Council
  • Election of Mark Hayes, Sue James and Margaret Newens during contested election

A full note of the AGM is available on the website or alternatively by request from Membership on 0191 233 9101.

A big Thank You to Our Volunteers

The last six months have been very busy with volunteers contributing to new resources and training materials.  We would like to extend a special thank you to Jan who has been lending a hand with this.  Ambassadors across the country have attended 27 events so far.  As a result of your efforts and other promotional activity we have seen a big increase in enquiries coming into the office.

Recent highlights include:  a very busy Fairtrade Fortnight that generated 544,853 steps to date (which is around 25,000 per day), International Women’s Day celebrations throughout the country and a Bristol meeting of Shared Interest Ambassadors and Fairtrade Bristol Ambassadors.

We know that there are many events to come so if you are thinking of getting involved, please let us know. This means that we can keep track of the hours you give and monitor the enquiries generated.  A few Ambassadors have asked about attending the Greenbelt Festival and unfortunately due to the logistics we have been unable to commit to a stall this time.  We would however love to hear from anyone that attends the event so that we can look at it as a possibility for next year.

Ambassador Margaret Newens manning a stand at the One World Week Craft Fair in Milton Keynes