Sixty years of Fair Trade: A brief history of the Fair Trade movement

During its history of over 60 years, Fair Trade has developed into a widespread movement with recognition on a political and mainstream business level.

The Fair Trade movement today is a global movement. Over a million small-scale producers and workers are organised in as many as 3,000 grassroots organisations and their umbrella structures in over 50 countries in the South. Their products are sold in thousands of World-shops or Fair Trade shops, supermarkets and many other sales points in the North and, increasingly, in sales outlets in the Southern hemisphere. The movement is engaged in debates with political decision-makers in the European institutions and international fora on making international trade fairer. And Fair Trade has made mainstream business more aware of its social and environmental responsibility. In short: Fair Trade is becoming increasingly successful.

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Global issues

Trade and development