There’s some sun forecast for this weekend, and I’m sure many of us will be doing our utmost to soak up some joy from that mysterious yellow disc in the sky.  The supermarkets are full of barbeque food and accoutrements – and I was pleasantly surprised to see that you can now get Fairtrade disposable [...]

I was in Lidl yesterday and pleasantly surprised to see that they’re doing offers on Fairtrade goods to celebrate Fairtrade Fortnight.  There’s really no excuse not to buy Fairtrade at these prices – a bag of Fairtrade Organic Bananas are only 99c, and there was generous discounts on their Fairtrade instant coffee, sugar and chocolate [...]

It’s week two of Fairtrade Fortnight, and as well as asking people to choose Fairtrade when they’re shopping, Fairtrade advocates are also lobbying food producers to switch to Fairtrade ingredients.  The theme of Fairtrade Fortnight 2010 is tea, and Oxfam Ireland are asking Irish tea drinkers to lobby the two most popular Irish tea brands [...]

FairTrade Fortnight runs until March 7, and this year’s theme is the Big Swap. Organisers are encouraging people to swap their usual shopping choices for FairTrade products. I always buy FairTrade whenever I can: bananas and chocolate being one of the staples. It was great to see Cadbury make thier Dairy Milks a FairTrade product, [...]

Thanks to all of you who entered our Oxfam Fair Trade Christmas Hamper giveaway: the response was great, and we’re delighted to announce that the following two people will be receiving hampers stuffed full of luxurious Christmas treats: Lynn McCormack and Denis Teeling You can still shop online at the Oxfam Fair Trade Online Shop [...]

Oxfam Ireland have generously provided us with two of their Fair Trade Luxury Christmas Hampers to give away. Each hamper contains a Fair Trade Christmas Cake, luxury chocolate, nuts, biscuits, tea, coffee and much more. One of these hampers will sort you out for all your Christmas treats, or you can pass it on as [...]

We’re joined today by Irish Times journalist Louise Holden for a special guest post on the politics of shopping. Grocery shopping has become complex to the point of absurdity. There has been a steady convolution of the simple act of shopping over the last twenty years, but recession brings a new and bewildering twist. How [...]

Gillian Morrison with comment #18! Congratulations Gillian, your Fair Break hamper will soon be winging its way to you. Thanks to everyone else who participated – and don’t forget to enter our Milano’s giveaway!

It was announced today that Cadbury’s are going to use Fairtrade cocoa in the production of their famous Dairy Milk bars, starting this summer.  This is obviously a tremendous boost to Fairtrade – the Dairy Milk is Cadbury’s best-selling bar, worth €13.8 million per annum in Ireland alone. This is a great step towards Fairtrade [...]

There seems to be a perception out there that Fairtrade food is always much more expensive than it’s non-Fairtrade equivalent, but that hasn’t been my experience.  Fairtrade foods often cost only a nominal amount more, usually in the region of 20c-50c for something like tea or coffee.  And there’s some genuine Fairtrade bargains to be [...]