Profairtrade Development Enterprise
March 2018
Profairtrade Development Enterprise is a Fair Trade Trading Organization and The Preda Foundation, a Social Development Organization.
(www.predafairtrade.net) Based in the Philippines it is an Fair Trade independent trading organization based on Fair Trade criteria and principles of social and moral responsibility with the main goal of helping small fruit growing farmers, and artisans, especially Ingenious people. It provides fair prices and a premium payment and works to improve working and living conditions.
ORGANIC MANGO PROJECTS. From its earning it helps farmers with small village based development projects such as water wells, hand pumps, community toilets and water systems. It gives organic training, self-organizing and values and commitment to environmental care and protection. It provides markets for the produce of the Aeta Indigenous farmers at fair prices. It has established organic mango puree in the German Market certified organic and fair trade by Naturland and Ceres.
COUNTERS SLAVERY, UNFAIR TRADE AND SOCIAL INJUSTICE. Preda fair trade while promoting and practicing principles of Fair Trade it also campaigns against unfair trade practices and social injustice in communities. It sees the victims of human trading and trafficking as victims of modern slavery that must be opposed and challenged. It saves victims of human traffickers and advocates against the trade in humans wherever it is found especially the in the sex trade industry.
FUNDING HELP FOR VICTIMS OF HUMAN TRAFFICKING. Profairtrade spends surplus earnings to promote social justice, combat exploitation, trafficking of persons, child, and women abuse and help victims of human rights violations especially minors in prison. It provides safe homes for child victims of sexual abuse and commercial sexual exploitation where they get healing, legal help, therapy, education and reintegration.
The projects for children and victims of human rights violations are implemented through a separate charitable organization know as The Preda Foundation Inc. The People’s Recovery Empowerment and Development Assistance (PREDA) Foundation Inc.(www.preda.org) was established in Olongapo City 1974 by Shay Cullen an Irish member of The Missionary Society of St. Columban, based in Navan, Ireland. He began and implemented social projects for abused children with the help of a Professional team of Filipinos.
The Profairtrade Organization, known as Preda fair trade began in 1975 by establishing craft making for young people in conflict with the law who were rescued by Preda social workers from the streets and jails. These children were targets for summary execution by the death squads of the martial law regime of the dictator Ferdinand Marcos. Many young lives were saved by the Preda project. Today they are saved from death squads
The project with small farmers began in 1993, Profairtrade (Preda fair trade) began a partnership with small mango farmers to buy their mangos and other fruit at fair prices and process them into dried mangos and later into Mango puree or mash for the making of fruit drinks and other products. These products are exported by container to the customers in Europe and Asia. These poor people are being exploited by the cartel of price-fixing fruit buyers and national and multi-national fruit exporters and processors. Preda fair-trade brings some social justice to the farmers they help
The Profairtrade, established connections with small farmer’s cooperatives, for the Preda Farmer’s association in Mindanao and in Zambales and established partnerships with individual growers and formed small groups from whom Preda buys mangos of all sizes shapes and variety without distinction at a higher price than prevailing prices by adding a premium. The drying and product development was done in partnership with Profood a high quality skilled processing partner which also does the packaging of the dried fruit products for Preda and meets all the EU standards.
The combined buying of mangos helped break the price-fixing buying cartel. Thanks to our importing partners, world shops and the Preda Fair Trade customers the sales of the mangos increased greatly and so did the volume of fruit bought from the farmers over the years offering better prices. The buying was done at higher prices and farmers preferred to sell to Preda and Profood until millions of kilos of fresh mangos were being bought by Profairtrade and Profood. This created a challenging competition for the price-fixing cartel. We believe that Preda Fair Trade helped break up the price-fixing cartel. The demand for mango products has grown and competition increased. The value of the mango fruit has steadily risen befitting all mango growers especially the small growers, those only with only a few trees.
A small farmer, one with 50 trees or less. Not all the trees blossom every year,perhaps half only will blossom and produce fruit the amount of mangos depends on weather; typhoons, floods, drought and insect infestations, fungus attack that can damage the crop. It must be remembered that there is only one harvest a year or sometimes when naturally grown the trees produce fruit only every two years. So the small farmers need special assistance from time to time. They are growing rice, vegetables and have a mixed farming practice. Others like the indigenous people also make baskets to supplement their livelihood. Preda gave pedicab Bicycles to farmers so they would have a livelihood after a bad harvest
Preda is promoting organic growing. Preda opposes the use of chemicals. The farmers can increase the number of blossoms and fruit by spraying the trees with chemical (Potassium Nitrate and also toxic pesticides) Preda opposed this practice and buys primarily from naturally grown mangos and is promoting organic growing practices. The Aeta ingenious people have harvested the wild Pico mangos for generations and they are naturally grown and Preda is assisting them to develop the Pico mango variety and become organically certified.
Many other kinds of fruit are bought but in smaller volume. Profairtrade and Profood buys all shapes and sizes of mango fruit and also pineapple, Papaya ,Guinabanao, Passion fruit and Calamansi but in lesser amounts. Always paying the price the farmer asks and above the prevailing price with a premium or bonus added. Today the Preda Dried mangos , mango-coco balls, Dreid green mangos and sugar free dried mangos are availble in Ireland and the UK and World shops throughout Europe and Japan. (www.preda.net)
Directly paying a premium to the farmers. While fair prices is paid to the farmers on delivery of the mangos Preda agriculturists are also visiting the farmers to buy during the harvest and also paying the premium separately for transparency and documentation reasons and for customers of Preda fair trade products to come to know some of the farmers and even to visit them. Visitors are welcome especially at Harvest time which is from March to June in the Northern Island of Luzon. The harvest is from January to August in Mindanao. Preda fair trade It is done without discriminating and picking only the biggest fruit, all sizes are bought . This is a huge benefit to the growers there are no rejects.
Preda fair trade has a unique chemical free dried mango dried without added preservative or coloring ,completely natural and mango puree also. The puree or mash is exported to Germany and is combined with organic apples and is made into apple-mango and mango-orange and other fruits to make new drinks and smoothies. These are healthy and like many fruits can be strong antioxidant
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0023643806000673
Preda is in partnership with the indigenous native growers to bring them into organic growing.
Profairtrade also delivers additional assistance to the poorest families providing other help such as training, community education,school supplies and pedi-cabs. There is capacity training and product development seminars, housing assistance for handicraft and other producers. Some of these training seminars and capacity building is done in cooperation with the Preda partners in developed countries who import and distribute the Preda producers products. Preda assists the farmers together with other agencies in helping the indigenous people to claim back their ancestral domain.
Thousand of trees of different varieties are planted every year under the tree planting program conducted during the rainy season and paid for by Preda fair trade. This is one of the additional benefits of Preda fair trade to small farmers and indigenous people Preda Fair trade provides every year 2,500 mango grafted Saplings 1.5 meter tall and other tree varieties, mahogany, teak, Demalima etc. to restore logged-out deforested land. This also helps the farmers increase there rights to their ancestral lands by introducing improvements as required by law. It also helps resist mining corporations from claiming the ancestral lands
This 4 to 5 ft. grafted tree sapling is guaranteed to survive and group and produce first fruit within five to six years. Preda youth groups and international volunteers join in the planting during the rainy season July to October. This helps the farmers expand their mango tree farm and income and also saves the soil from eroding and being washed away. The other climatic beneficial effect of replanting trees on deforested land is to reduce global warming and CO2 in the atmosphere. Volunteers also visit the farmers and sometimes they choose to live in the villages and work with them in the fields.
Preda fair Trade helps other small producer artisan groups and helps the members to improve designs, create new products promotes their products locally and abroad and gives them capacity building training and interest free production loans and other forms of assistance. The materials used are sustainable, environmental friendly and some products are made with recycled raw materials. Preda Fair Trade is a trading partner of the Major importers; DWP, Ravensburg, GEPA, Wuppertal, el Puente, FTO The Netherlands, World Shops in Germany, Austria, Italy, Switzerland, The Netherlands , UK, Ireland, Korea , Japan, New Zealand.
