Preda Fair Trade overcoming poverty
Fr. Shay Cullen
Juan and Maria dela Costa are a poor farmer couple living with three children in the mountains of Zambales 140 kilometers north of Manila.They have lived in poverty making a living from planting vegetables, honey and gathering mango fruits to sell in the market many kilometers. Like millions of impoverished indigenous people they are subsistence farmers surviving on what they can grow on spare public lands they don’t own.
Juan knows nothing of the causes of his poverty. He only knows that the traders in the towns will only give him four or five pesos a kilo for his Pico mangoes and he knows they are worth three time that amount. But if he does not sell them for the low price they will quickly rot in the hot tropical climate. Its not worth his hard work and long walk into the town with a heavy sack of mangoes .So he did not do it any more. The fruit were left on the ground.
Greed and injustice and the total lack of government help is behind his hardship. His children will remain poor and uneducated. At least that is how it was until Preda Fair Trade came to his village and offered to buy his mangoes at three times what the traders were paying.
Fair Trade is the movement that brings economic justice and livelihood with dignity to hundreds of thousands of poor people around the world. Preda Fair trade is a leader in the movement since 1980 The good people of conscience who want to live out values and principles and put them into to practice in meaningful practical ways turn to buy Preda Fair-Trade dried mangoes in the UK super markets.They who believe in reaching out and helping the people who need help most will buy fair trade products like Preda Dried Mangoes. These are distributed in the UK by Forest Feast brands available in most supermarkets. They act on their Christian conscience and want to support through fair trade the people in the developing world who work hard to help themselves and their family. That’s why the customers buy the products and they support the Fair Trade. But they also appreciate the high quality of the products.
Trying to alleviate poverty keep children in their villages going to school and ,away from human traffickers I have been actively helping many poor farmers through paying higher fair prices for their mango fruits.
The project helps small farmers, indigenous people, and artisans who meet the criteria of Fair-Trade and fairly produced products. The dried mangoes are available in stores through Forest Feast in the UK. The benefits and earnings return to help the producers and farmers and a percentage goes to help abused children get shelter, therapy, justice, and care. www.preda.org
Some of those earning also go to protect and improve the environment by tree planting and helping children who are victims of commercial sexual exploitation and abuse. Preda fair trade and our partners and supporters oppose the trade in human persons and helps the survivors.
The reason is because the dried mangoes and the Preda dried mango is fair, chemical free with no additives, and naturally sweet and low sugar if so desired. A totally sugar free dried mango is also available. The people are not exploited and the benefits are for the small farmers and victims of exploitation. The customers are partners with us in helping the poor to be poor no more. www.predafairtrade.net
Fair-Trade is one of the best ways to help people overcome injustice, oppression, and poverty and to have a life of dignity. We all ought to make that extra effort to use our spending power to help others as we go to the grocery and buy Fairly Traded quality products. They might cost a bit more but fair minded customers consider that fair wages and benefits are paid and they don’t want to eat food that causes hardship and injustice to others.
The one thing the wise educated shopper does not want is to use their buying power and choice to enrich the already super rich who control the multinational food corporations. In fact there are so many good people buying Fairly traded products that help the poor get out of poverty that the multinationals corporations are posing as fair trade companies .It is a billion pound business in the Uk alone.These unethical companies poise as fair trade practitioners but they have only a few products fairly traded just for show, Most of their other products are not certified fair trade products. So for sure there is some unfairness and exploitation in the rest of their products. So the wise and wary consumers keep away from the fake and frauds. They look for and find the products that are tested and true fair-traded products.
The Fair trade shops are the really genuine providers of all strictly fairly trade products so that’s where the smart consumers go. Then of course there thousands of customers with a heart and belief in justice and what is right who know the best fair trade brands and they look for them in super markets and on the internet.
So the wise and knowledgeable consumers with a heart for justice and want to be one with the poor and oppressed and this rising out of hunger and hardship buy the fair trade products.
