'Just Things' For Those Interested in Fair Trade
Submitted by Taran on Sun, 12/10/2006 - 15:59
While I was in Nicaragua in 2005, I met Steve Herrick - we were both working with SSC at the time and hanging out at NicaLiving HQ and talked about technology and ideas about how people could better leverage technology to increase their own quality of life. A lean toward the digital divide as a symptom, not the disease.
We talked a lot over some of the best coffee I've ever had. Phil (NicaLiving) had these Nicaraguan beans - organically grown (and for the life of me, I can't remember the name!).
I got an email from him today; he pointed me at Just Things: The Fair Trade Journal of Applied Counter-Economics - an open content licensed magazine that's on it's third issue. Of course, he's the Editor and Publisher. This issue has a lot about Free Software and even features an interview with Franz Schmidt, the creator of Scribus.
The article 'Fair Trade... coming to a theater near you!' is interesting as well. I'll wait for the next issue where there is supposed to be an in depth look at whether fair-trade coffee actually works. That's really interesting to me, because it's supposed to include actual interviews with farmers from Nicaraguas and the US roasters that buy from them. That it interests me more than the software aspects in this issue might surprise Steve, but hey... I like my coffee.
If you get a chance, out of the few megabytes you may read each day, you may find Just Things: The Fair Trade Journal of Applied Counter-Economics is worth taking a look at, especially since it has no ads within the PDF.
The coffeehouse here in
The coffeehouse here in Chicago where I hang out, Intelligentsia, is heavily involved with fair trade, and also have a pretty detailed page at their website explaining the issues involved -- those who are interested can check it out at http://www.intelligentsiacoffee.com/origin/directtrade . Even more interesting, perhaps, is that the company as much as possible even tries to send all their baristas down to Nicaragua at least once, to give them a much more profound understanding of the bean-to-latte international process, and why fair trade is such an important thing to begin with. I've always found it fascinating that a retail coffee company would find such a thing important, all the way down to the $7-an-hour coffeeslingers actually working in the stores. Anyway, thought you and your readers would find this interesting.
Now that's cool.
And Nicaragua is one of my favorite spots in the world, too.
I guess it comes down to people appreciating what they do. And even appreciated for what they do.
Fair Trade Documentary
For those of you who are interested in the issue of Fair trade, there is a powerful documentary out called “Black Gold,” that documents the lives of Ethiopian coffee farmers and clearly demonstrates why all of us should be asking for Fair Trade coffee. The film was recently released in the theater but is now available to the public on DVD via California Newsreel. You can read more about the documentary or pick up a copy of it here at http://newsreel.org/
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