Singapore, a city state with a population of just over 5 million people, consists of a fairly typical urban Asian mix of new and old buildings. What is not so typical is its leadership in green construction and green renovation, especially in the institutional and commercial sectors. The Building and Construction Authority of Singapore recently won the International award for energy efficiency from the US-based alliance to Save Energy for its commitment to achieve a national target of greening at least 80% of the buildings in Singapore by 2030. From no green buildings in 2004 Singapore has achieved green standards for 21.9% of its buildings by 2014. As those knowing about Singapore’s strict regulatory frameworks might expect, the green building targets are being achieved through a combination of voluntary industry action and regulations.

Green buildings implemented so far cover many uses in the commercial and institutional sector. Two examples:

A new 204,000 square feet shopping mall described as ‘ultra-hip’, J-Cube, lists the following green attributes:

• Air-conditioning system with an efficiency of 0.66 kW/ton
• Permanent measurement and verification instrumentation for the monitoring of chilled-water plant efficiency
• Use of energy efficient lighting
• Photovoltaic panels on rooftop with system capacity of about 50 kWp (Kilowatt peak – the output power achieved under full solar radiation)
• Rainwater harvesting system for landscape irrigation
• Recycling of waste heat and air handling unit condensates
• Green demolition
• Green leases for tenants

The green features produce estimated energy savings of 8,793,984 kWh/year and estimated water savings of 3,419 m3/year.

A new Pan Pacific ParkRoyal hotel in Singapore has implemented:

• High efficiency air-conditioning system
• Extensive/vertical greenery
• Sky gardens and lush landscaping, including solar-powered features that power landscape lighting, constituting more than 200 percent of the total land area
• Rainwater harvesting and use of NEWater (reclaimed water from sewage produced by Singapore’s Public Utilities Board).
• Extensive use of natural light
• Use of natural ventilation in spaces such as external hotel corridors
• Use of energy efficient LED and T5 type fluorescent lamps
• Renewable energy
• Dual refuse chutes separating recyclable from non-recyclable waste
• Water efficient fittings
• Automatic sensors to regulate energy and water usage
• Green Leases for both office tenants and hotel operators

These have achieved estimated energy savings of 3,117,212 kWh/year and estimated water savings of 6,900 m3/year.

Lots of information on Singapore’s green building initiatives, including policies, manuals, and building achievements, can be found on the website of the Building and construction Authority at http://www.bca.gov.sg/

Generally, in Canada, provincial legislation requires municipalities to provide a substantial reduction in property taxes to lands considered to be used for farming. However those same laws often avoid the question of the definition of a farm. In Ontario:

• raising of horses for racing,
• growing of crops for energy,
• raising of grapes and grains for alcoholic beverages, and
• raising of crops for medicinal ingredients, including medical marijuana,

are all considered agricultural activities and qualify the landowner or tenant for reduced property taxes. Forested lands are covered until a different regulation but also qualify for reduced property taxes. Every property that receives a farm property tax reduction means that other taxpayers in the municipality pay higher taxes in order to contribute towards the municipality’s budget.

This issue has recently come to the forefront in Metro Vancouver because of the concern of some council members about granting property tax reductions to legal medical marijuana production facilities.

The objective of farm property tax reduction seems to be to provide a subsidy to farmers. The province of Newfoundland and Labrador expresses it as:

• Encourage owners of idle land to put it into farm production.
• Provides some tax relief to farmers who have high assessments due to the relatively large amount of land that they require to operate effectively.

The first objective is clearly in conflict with protection of species at risk legislation. Such species as monarch butterflies and bobolinks require open areas of land for their survival. The idea that every square metre of land should be in ‘productive’ use is absurd if we also consider protection of open space loving species to be a valid objective. Landowners should be encouraged to maintain open areas of land populated with a multitude of unharvested native species in order to support habitat for species at risk, or at risk of becoming ‘at risk’.

The second objective would surely suggest that farm property tax relief is for farmers that produce food. Why should landowners who produce alcoholic beverages, crops for fuel ethanol for vehicles, or medical marijuana receive a tax subsidy from all other taxpayers while landowners who maintain habitat for species at risk or passive parks for recreation pay full property taxes.

Metro Vancouver council members are exploring the medical marijuana property tax break. It seems they might be on to something much bigger. A national dialogue about who pays property taxes and who gets an exemption, full or partial, appears to GallonDaily to be long overdue.

Relevant reports, with more details relevant to the BC situation, are available at http://www.metrovancouver.org/planning/development/AgricultureAndFood/Documents/Property_Tax_Scenario_Analysis_for_Agricultural_and_Industrial_Lands.pdf  and

https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/1183969-rpa-june-6-2014-agenda.html select page 114.

this week is Canadian Environment Week. The Canadian Environment Week Act requires that “Throughout Canada, in every year, the week that includes June 5 shall be kept and observed under the name of Canadian Environment Week.” That’s all the Act states. No description of what ‘keeping and observing shall require’ and no penalties for not keeping and observing Canadian Environment Week. The Canadian Environment Week Act is one of the shortest pieces of legislation on Canada’s books.

But at least it was enough to prompt the Minister of the Environment, The Honourable Leona Aglukkaq, to put out a press release, something that happens rarely these days. The press release stated:

Government of Canada taking strong action today for a more sustainable tomorrow
June 2, 2014 – Ottawa, Ontario – Environment Canada

Today, Minister Aglukkaq marked the beginning of Canadian Environment Week 2014 by inviting Canadians to reflect on the importance of protecting and preserving their rich, natural heritage.

Canadian Environment Week is observed annually during the first full week of June, and is a time to celebrate the achievements and hard work of all Canadians who are taking action every day to improve our environment at home, at work and in our communities.

A number of important activities and events are held throughout and around the week such as the Commuter Challenge, Clean Air Day on June 4, World Environment Day on June 5 and World Oceans Day on June 8.

Through its recent announcements of a National Conservation Plan (NCP) and the 2013-2016 Federal Sustainable Development Strategy, the Government of Canada is committed to protecting the environment and ensuring that Canada’s ecosystems are part of healthy, connected and sustainably managed landscapes.

The NCP will provide a more coordinated approach to conservation efforts across the country with an emphasis on enabling Canadians to conserve and restore lands and waters in and around their communities, and making it easier for citizens living in cities to connect with nature. The NCP includes significant new investments over five years to secure ecologically sensitive lands, support voluntary conservation and restoration actions, and strengthen marine and coastal conservation. In addition, it will contain new initiatives designed to restore wetlands and to encourage Canadians to connect with nature close to home through protected areas and green spaces located in or near urban areas.

Quick Facts

Since 2006, the federal government has taken significant action to protect Canada’s natural areas. In addition to adding an area nearly twice the size of Vancouver Island to the network of federal protected areas (including work to create the first National Urban Park), and designating three additional Marine Protected Areas (totaling an area of 7,837 km²), we have secured more than 4,000 km² of ecologically sensitive private lands.

The Government has also supported partners in the delivery of hundreds of local projects to protect species at risk and their habitats, improved water quality in the Great Lakes, Lake Simcoe, and Lake Winnipeg, rehabilitated recreational fisheries habitat, and cleaned up contaminated sites.

Quotes

“We all have a role to play when it comes to protecting the environment. Through the NCP, our Government is taking tangible cooperative actions to help conserve and restore our lands and waters and connect Canadians with their environment. The NCP will enable Canadians actively participate in conservation and restoration while enhancing the connections between people and nature. I encourage all Canadians to use this week as an opportunity to get outside and do their part to conserve and enjoy the environment.”

– The Honourable Leona Aglukkaq, Minister of the Environment, Minister of the Canadian Northern Economic Development Agency and Minister for the Arctic Council

Environment Canada’s theme for Environment Week this year is “Strengthening Our Environment Today for Tomorrow”. For more information on what Environment Canada is doing for the week visit http://www.ec.gc.ca/sce-cew/Default.asp?lang=En&n=56886AF1-1  Just don’t get too exited about the program!

According to the UK’s Waste & Resources Action Programme, a government funded not for profit organization, more than 1.3 billion meals are wasted annually in UK’s hospitality and food service sector. WRAP states that 920,000 tonnes of food is wasted at hospitality and food service outlets each year, 75% of which is avoidable and could have been eaten. There is no equivalent data for Canada but based on population that would equate to 710 million meals or more than 500 million kg of edible food going to waste from Canada’s restaurant and food service sector. The figures do not include wastage from processing and packaging of the uneaten food.

The UK is beginning to do something about this enormous level of waste. London’s Food Save scheme, supported by the Mayor of London, the European Regional Development Fund and the London Waste and Recycling Board, has helped 15 of the capital’s small food businesses save more than £100,000 a year and prevent a staggering 23 tonnes of food going to waste. One typical restaurant has worked with the Food Save program to identify precisely the areas where food was being wasted and the possible options for reducing wastage. That restaurant has changed the size of and ingredients for certain dishes and has created daily delicious specials with food that would historically have gone to waste. They say that the amount being saved is enough to help pay for another member of staff.

The Mayor of London is now appealing for 200 more restaurants to join the free Food Save program, which has as an objective to divert more than 1,000 tonnes of food waste from landfill, reduce over 150 tonnes of food waste and save restaurant and food service businesses over £350,000. The program is being delivered by the Sustainable Restaurant Association (SRA) and Sustain, the alliance for better food and farming.

More information about the Food Save program is at http://www.thesra.org/sra_news/mayors-food-scheme-saving-restaurants-pubs-hotels-70-stone-food-mountains/

and much more information about sustainable restaurant initiatives through the UK Sustainable Restaurant Association website at http://www.thesra.org

A UK-based global consulting company in the food and beverage industry, Leatherhead Food Research, has published a brief ‘white paper’ discussing sustainability issues facing the food and beverage industry.

Key points in the white paper include:

• in the last five to ten years, there has been a dramatic shift in how food and drink companies are addressing sustainability issues. It has moved from being an initiative which sits to one side of the business in Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) or philanthropic strategies to being a main stream business consideration.
• many companies are beginning to realise that sustainability makes business sense, both from a financial point of view but also from the point of view of the longevity of their business
• key environmental initiatives that companies are involved in broadly fall into the following categories:
  • reduction of greenhouse gas emissions and management of carbon footprint
  • switching to the use of renewable energy
  • waste reduction
  • reformulation and recycling of packaging
  • reduction of water usage in manufacturing
• companies are becoming conscious of the need to understand the operations of their entire supply chain in order to mitigate any risks before they occur and to give them evidence for the good news stories about their products.
• the food and drink industry is a long way from the scenario where they are addressing sustainability in a ‘pre-competitive’ environment – such an environment would require companies to agree not to compete on a sustainability platform but to work together to achieve sustainability goals.

GallonDaily believes the white paper may be useful to executives in this industry sector. Our only quibble with it is that we believe that sustainability must become a more competitive issue if companies are to achieve meaningful goals and significant economic benefits.

The two page white paper, which links to a more detailed report priced at £720, is available at no cost by providing contact information at http://www.foodanddrinkeurope.com/smartlead/view/920567/3/?utm_source=newsletter_daily&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Newsletter%2BDaily&c=AM9QfACJmmQg6%2FLlNOfj9F8OjqLNe83j

In the early days of current concern about the impact of rising concentrations of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases on the global climate the phenomenon was generally described as global warming. Then environmentalists and some scientists found that those who denied the impact of rising concentrations of greenhouse gases on the climate were making progress with their ideas by pointing out that some key inhabited regions periodically experience cold spells and may in fact experience periods of more extreme cold more frequently in the future. Advocates lobbied successfully for changing the popularly used term to climate change.

Now a report from researchers with the Yale Project on Climate Change Communication and the George Mason University Center for Climate Change Communication suggests that the American public understands global warming much better than they understand climate change. Maybe the switch is terminology was not such a good idea after all.

Among the findings of the report:

• A nationally representative survey in January 2014 found that while Americans are equally familiar with the two terms, they are 4 times more likely to say they hear the term global warming in public discourse than climate change. Likewise, Americans are 2 times more likely to say they personally use the term global warming than climate change in their own conversations.
• A separate nationally representative survey (Survey Study 2) in November-December 2013 found
• that almost without exception, global warming is more engaging than climate change. Compared to climate
• change, the term global warming generates:
  • Stronger ratings of negative affect (i.e., bad feelings)
  • Overall, global warming generates significantly more top of mind associations to Icemelt (e.g., “melting glaciers”), Alarm (e.g., “world catastrophe”), Flood (e.g., “coastal flooding”), and Ozone (e.g., “the ozone hole”) categories. Climate change generates significantly more associations to Weather (e.g., “storms”) and Global Warming (e.g.,“global warming”) categories.
  • Within the Weather category, global warming generates a higher percentage of associations to “extreme weather” than does climate change, which generates more associations to general weather patterns.
  • Greater certainty that the phenomenon is happening
  • Greater understanding that human activities are the primary cause among political Independents.
  • Greater understanding of the scientific consensus among Independents and liberals.
  • More intense worry about the issue, especially among men, Generation Y, Generation X, Democrats, liberals and moderates.
  • A greater sense of personal threat.
  • A greater sense of threat to one’s own family.
  • A greater sense of threat to future generations among Independents and Generation Y.
  • A greater sense that people in the U.S. are being harmed right now,
  • Higher issue priority ratings for action by the president and Congress.
  • Greater support for a large or small-scale effort by the U.S. (although climate change generates more support for a medium-scale effort, especially among Republicans).
  • Greater willingness to join a campaign to convince elected officials to take action.
• Use of the term climate change appears to actually reduce issue engagement by Democrats, Independents, liberals, and moderates, as well as a variety of subgroups within American society.
• Overall, Americans are slightly more worried about global warming (52% are very or somewhat worried about it) than they are about climate change (48%). Americans are +6 points more likely to be “very worried” about global warming (15%) than climate change (9%), which is a statistically significant difference.

The authors note that connotative meanings are dynamic and change, sometimes rapidly. It is possible that with repeated use, climate change will come to acquire similar connotative meanings as global warming, that the two will eventually become synonymous for most people, or that climate change will supplant global warming as the dominant term in public discourse. In the meantime, however, the results of these studies strongly suggest that the two terms continue to mean different things to many Americans.

The report contains much more data on public opinion analysed by use of the terms global warming and climate change, also by political inclination. We have not summarized that data here as it is based on the US political system and, like the rest of the report, may have little or no relevance to Canada. However, with no similar data available in Canada, we encourage readers to look at the US data and come to their own conclusions about its relevance to Canada.

Many people understand global warming and climate change as virtually the same thing but technically they are not identical. Put simply, global warming is a result of increasing greenhouse gases in the atmosphere and, after human releases of such gases. is the factor which causes the problem. Climate change, the increasing frequency and severity of disturbances in the already disturbed atmosphere, is the result of global warming. However, GallonDaily’s opinion is that information sources should use whichever term is best understood by users of the information.

The 31 page report What’s In A Name? Global Warming vs. Climate Change is available at http://environment.yale.edu/climate-communication/article/global-warming-vs-climate-change/

According to a report by the US environmental group Friends of the Earth, nanoparticles are being used in processed foods, are not listed on the ingredient label, and are not being regulated by any government agency. As GallonDaily and GallonLetter have previously reported, nanoparticles are extremely fine particles of various substances that illustrate chemical and biological characteristics that are often quite different from those of the parent material. According to the data published by FOE, titanium dioxide is the nanomaterial currently used most commonly in food products. FOE calls foods containing nanoparticles “nanofoods”.

Note that GallonDaily has no independent confirmation of the FOE report nor is it known whether similar additives are being used in food products sold in Canada.

The 35 page FOE report, entitled Tiny Ingredients Big Risks, states that:

• there has been a 10-fold increase in unregulated, unlabeled “nanofood” products on the American market over the past six years. The number of nanofood and beverage products FOE knows to be on the market has grown to 94. These products are being made by major companies including Kraft, General Mills, Hershey, Nestle, Mars, Coca-Cola, Unilever, Smucker’s and Albertsons. Due to a lack of required labeling and disclosure, the number of food and beverage products containing undisclosed nanomaterials is likely much greater.
• many food items that Americans eat on a daily basis contain nanomaterial ingredients. These include familiar products such as processed and cream cheeses, cookies, doughnuts, coffee creamer, chocolate syrup and other chocolate products, pudding, mayonnaise, mashed potatoes, milk, soy, almond, and rice beverages, mints, gum, popcorn, salad dressing and oils, yogurt, cereal, candy, crackers, pasta and sports drinks.
• the nanofoods market is expected to grow to US$20.4 billion by 2020.
• there is also mounting evidence that nanomaterials are being used to package and preserve fresh fruit and vegetable products, which could threaten the integrity of staple healthy foods.
• nano-agrochemicals are now being used on farms and released into the environment in the absence of regulations.
• an increasingly large body of peer-reviewed evidence indicates some nanomaterials may harm human health and the environment.
• U.S. regulation of nanomaterials is wholly inadequate and leaves consumers, workers and the environment at risk.

Friends of the Earth makes recommendations for governments, the food industry, and consumers. For the food industry and retailers FOE recommends that food producers and retailers must stop selling nanofood, nanofood packaging, nanofood contact materials and nano-agrochemicals until:

• The public is involved in decision making.
• Nanotechnology-specific regulation is put in place to protect the public, workers and the environment from potential new hazards associated with nano-toxicity.
• All manufactured nano-ingredients are clearly indicated on product labels, allowing members of the public to make an informed choice about product use.
• The presence of nanomaterials is disclosed to workers and other downstream users along the supply chain.
• Manufacturers work with regulators to ensure that their products have undergone appropriate safety testing, and provide the relevant data regarding the health and environmental safety of their product. No data, no market.
• All relevant data related to safety assessments, and the methodologies used to obtain them, are placed in the public domain.
• All food and agricultural products which include manufactured nanomaterials are clearly labeled to allow members of the public, workers and farmers to make an informed choice.

The report is available at http://www.foe.org/news/news-releases/2014-05-new-report-tiny-ingredients-big-risks

Researchers with the US Department of Energy Pacific Northwest National Laboratory have found that commercial buildings could cut their heating and cooling electricity use by an average of 57 percent with advanced energy-efficiency controls. Actual energy savings ranged from 20 to 90 percent. The results come out of a year-long trial of the controls at malls, grocery stores and other buildings across the country.

The findings include:

• heating and cooling are among the biggest energy consumers in buildings, largely because most buildings don’t use sophisticated controls.
• packaged HVAC units in commercial buildings in the US consume the same amount of electricity each year as 8 million US residents, or about 2,600 trillion British thermal units of energy.
• HVAC units can be configured with advanced controls to automatically adjust their operations based on conditions inside and outside a building.
• using sensors and variable-speed motors, the controls decide when and how fast ventilation fans should run, and if the units can use naturally cold air from the outside instead of mechanically cooling indoor air.
• larger buildings such as malls, which need bigger HVAC units, saved more energy than smaller buildings. And buildings that ran ventilation fans more, such as stores open long hours, tended to save more energy.
• on average, it will take a building owner three years to recoup the cost of buying and installing advanced controls.

The researchers say that building owners interested in upgrading or replacing their HVAC systems can learn more from the Advanced Rooftop Campaign, which was formed by DOE’s Better Building Alliance, the American Society of Heating, Refrigerating and Air Conditioning Engineers, and the Retail Industry Leaders Association.

More information from PNL at http://www.pnnl.gov/news/release.aspx?id=1055

BT, formerly British Telecom but now a privatized global telecom company, has published one of the most fascinating sustainability reports of the Spring 2014 sustainability report season. Comprehensively covering environmental, social, and economic aspects of the Company’s activities the web version of the report, published under the headline “Better Future”, puts the exciting stuff upfront and the nerdy details towards the bottom of the series of web pages. The web version is exceptionally well laid out and sections are well connected. The PDF version, with somewhat less information than the web version is far less fun and lacking in pictures, clearly intended more as a reference work than a fun exploration of the Company’s many sustainability activities and most likely with the expectation that very few people actually sit down and read annual sustainability reports. We encourage readers who are interested in sustainability reporting to look at BT’s sustainability report at http://www.btplc.com/betterfuture/betterfuturereport/default.aspx

Among the highlights of BT’s sustainability activities last year:

investment of 1.01% of adjusted pre-tax profits in responsible and sustainable business activities in 2013/14.

reduced energy consumption by 3% in 2013/14, with energy savings programmes generating more than £25m ($38m CDN) in annualised cost saving. This takes the total annualised saving, from programmes run over the last five years, to £131m ($197m CDN).

connected 19 locations in Africa to broadband internet via satellite as part of BT’s Connecting Africa programme, improving access to critical services for around 95,000 people and indirectly benefitting up to 570,000 people.

around a third of the 6.7m adults in the UK who are not yet online live in social housing. BT is targeting these areas of digital and social exclusion and bringing cost effective internet access to those who need it.

invested more than £5m in filtering tools and education to help children and young adults use the internet safety. This year, the Company has launched a new filter, BT Parental Controls, which gives new customers the option to install network-based parental controls as standard. To help our Wi-Fi site partners stop pornographic and child abuse material being viewed on their premises, we have launched BT Wi-Fi Protect.

this year helped customers avoid carbon emissions amounting to 1.3 times the end-to-end carbon impact of BT’s business. This was an improvement on last year, but BT still has some way to go to achieve its 2020 goal of 3:1.

assessed emissions from every tier of its supply chain using environmentally extended input-output analysis (EEIO). This technique estimates the direct and supply chain emissions for different industries by combining macroeconomic data on output and trade with emissions data.

reduced operational carbon emissions from our global business by 25.5%;

all UK electricity consumed now comes from renewable sources, and 78% of employees are involved in energy saving initiatives.

waste to landfill reduced by 57% compared with our 30% target for the year.

water use in the UK decreased for the twelfth consecutive year in 2013/14, to 1,276m cubic metres from 1,308m cubic metres.

worked with a consortium including WWF-UK, Forum for the Future, The Climate Group and leading UK and multinational companies to launch the Net Positive Movement. This is a diverse group working together to promote the Net Positive approach and encourage other businesses to do more than simply reduce harm to the environment.

Much more information in BT’s 110 page “Better Future 2014” report at http://www.btplc.com/betterfuture/betterfuturereport/default.aspx

A new report from researchers at The School of Oriental and African Studies of the University of London suggests that one of the basic missions of the fair trade movement is not being achieved, at least when it comes to fair trade coffee from Ethiopia and Uganda. The research found no evidence that Fairtrade has made a positive difference to the wages and working conditions of those employed in the production of the coffee produced for Fairtrade certified export. In some cases the researchers found that those employed in areas where there are Fairtrade producer organisations are significantly worse paid, and treated, than those employed for wages in the production of the same commodities in areas without any Fairtrade certified institutions.

The research team has been careful not to slam fair trade products but it does suggest that fair trade organizations need to pay far more attention to the conditions of those extremely poor rural people – especially women and girls – employed in the production of commodities labelled and sold to ‘ethical consumers’ who expect their purchases to improve the lives of the poor.

The researchers state:

• Fairtrade has made no positive difference – relative to other forms of employment in the production of the same crops – to wage workers.
• Systematically, wage workers in the sample in research sites characterised by the presence of Fairtrade certified producer organizations earned less than equivalent workers in research sites without Fairtrade production. A relatively high proportion of wage workers employed in the production of commodities sold to and through Fairtrade certified channels earned less than 60 per cent of the median wage for equivalent work.
• The reasons for Fairtrade’s failure to make a clear positive difference to wages and conditions, or to the amount of work offered, are fairly clear. They have to do – especially in the production of “smallholder” commodities – with what this research suggests has been in the past a wilful denial of the significance of wage labour and an obsessive concentration [by fair trade organizations] on producers/employers and their organisations.
• This research suggests that a large number of obstacles remain in implementing improved standards in a way that will benefit rural workers. First and foremost is the need not just for more monitoring and evaluation, but also for better methods. And they have to do – again, especially where Fairtrade certification is awarded to cooperatives – with the espousal of a romantic ideology of how cooperatives operate in poor rural areas. One implication of revealing the obfuscation and even inversion of reality sustained by this ideology is that Fairtrade may well help to make a contribution (though the evidence suggests it is not the most effective contribution) to poverty reduction; but that it does so as an unintended consequence of its promotion of a class of emerging rural capitalists.

On page 122 of the report the authors provide 12 recommendations for changes to fair trade programs that they believe will bring such programs closer to their expressed goals. however, the authors also note:

These recommendations are unlikely to be welcomed by Fairtrade organisations, or by the supermarkets that profit from the important public relations and product differentiation opportunities that certified products provide. It may appear that these recommendations are demanding, unrealistic even. If that is the case, then at a minimum our research suggests that Fairtrade labelling and branding information needs to be changed substantially to reflect the limitations of the claims made and an inability to monitor the wages and working conditions of people employed on the farms of members of small producers organisations. However, it may well be that it proves too costly for Fairtrade organizations, and the producer and retail organizations who trumpet their Fairtrade certification, to implement these recommendations in such a way that a substantive positive difference can be made to the welfare of manual agricultural wage workers. That is one reason why we recommend a broader public attention to, even potentially a reallocation of resources from Fairtrade towards, other types of intervention, to be supported by governments and donor agencies.

The full 129 page report, appendices, and frequently asked questions are available at http://ftepr.org/publications/#publication-563

A response from one of the leading global fair trade organizations, Fairtrade International, which reads to GallonDaily as way too defensive, can be found at http://www.fairtrade.net/single-view+M5a2383b864f.html