Part of the debate – in the Senedd at 6:37 pm on 22 November 2016.
Yes, I’m happy to recognise and support the comments that the Member makes, not just because I’m a Labour and Co-operative Assembly Member, but many people across the Chamber in different parties are active supporters of fair trade, and not just at Fairtrade Fortnight, both in the individual choices we make about goods that we buy and use, and you’re right to point to coffee as a particular example. I visited a group of people who had undergone fair trade accreditation—a different co-op, but you’re right to point to the Gumutindo co-op, as one of the larger ones, and the fair trade premium has made a really big difference to those farmers’ families and wider communities. So, it’s reinforcing the point that in the choices that we make in this country about how we procure and use different goods, it does make a really big difference across the rest of the world. And it’s part of the work that we do in encouraging people to want to undertake the form of fair trade accreditation, to actually then gain the benefit of the premium.
So, we can be proud of what we’ve done. We can also say there’s more that we could and should do, now here in Wales, together with our partners around the rest of the world.