Welcome!
The Ethical Purchasing Forum is a space for ongoing dialogue and collaboration, designed to bring together active citizens to explore trade issues and expand ethical trade in the Victoria region.
Below you'll find postings on ethical purchasing initiatives, events and discussions as well as news articles about Fair Trade and Ethical Purchasing. Articles are found through a daily scan of all Canadian news media online. Please note that the news postings on this site do not necessarily represent the views of the Ethical Purchasing Forum, rather they are meant as a survey of the mainstream and other online media's reporting on Fair Trade, ethical trade, ethical consumption and related issues.
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You are welcome to post your own ideas and announcements towards these goals right here on the Forum website. To register as an Ethical Purchasing Forum website-author, email your preferred nickname, first and last name, and email to solbcics@uvic.ca and you will be sent a password and instructions on making posts. Or simply click "add comment" at the bottom of each post. |
Don’t miss this fantastic event organized by Deb Morse, a participant at last years Ethical Purchasing Forum.
Live Green. Do Good. We’ll show you how!
July 5 and 6, 2008. 10am-5pm
Glendale Gardens, Victoria, BC
Just north of Camosun College Interurban Campus – See Getting There
Founded and directed by Victoria’s Deb Morse, The Organic Islands Festival and Sustainability Expo has become Canada’s largest outdoor green festival and features fun and entertainment for all ages; providing provocative, inspiring education about the green movement and how we can effectively make it part of our everyday lives. Advance ticket holders receive entry to festival and free entry to Arts in the Gardens, Aug 9 & 10. Avoid line-ups and purchase tickets at LifeStyle Markets in Victoria, 180-2950 Douglas Street, and Cook St. Village, Sidney locations.
From: www.organicislands.ca
July 3rd, 2008
| Category: Conferences and Events
We are pleased to invite you to participate in an Ethical Trading Forum entitled Igniting the Flame for a Sweat-free Olympics on June 12 in Vancouver, British Columbia. The forum is co-sponsored by the BC Federation of Labour, the Canadian Labour Congress, the Ethical Trading Action Group, and the New Westminster and Vancouver labour councils. For more information on the forum, as well as flyer to download, please go to: http://en.maquilasolidarity.org/en/etf2008 (more…)
May 26th, 2008
| Category: Conferences and Events
Doing all they can do to reduce impact on the environment
Kate Webb, The Province
Published: Sunday, March 09, 2008
Recycling? Check.
Composting? Check.
Reusable shopping bags? East Vancouver parents Shoni Field and Nathan Koehn have plenty.
But where some families leave off on their environmental to-do list the Field-Koehns are just getting started.
The family’s mission to reduce their ecological footprint began with simple, waste-reducing steps such as buying foods that required less packaging. But over time, Field’s concerns over feeding her two young boys, Zavery, 4, and Quillan, who’s 19 months old, prompted her to seek out an organic home delivery service so she could make her own organic baby food.
(Check out the 9 Obstacles to changing lifestyles by Robert Gifford, Environmental Psychologist at the University of Victoria, found towards the end of this article) (more…)
March 11th, 2008
| Category: Ethical Purchasing in the News
Activist Notes is a new blog to discuss issues relating to socially just and environmentally sustainable trade. Trade justice! It is coordinated by a few Canadian community organizers. Here is your invite, you obviously decide your level of involvement - read the blog, comment, write a post, affiliate, or take off…eh
At the recent Activist School of the Canadian Student Fair Trade Network, students said it would be cool to have a place to send affiliate information so a ‘map’ of the student trade justice community in Canada could be produced. Well, here is your chance…but this isn’t just for students. If you’re involved in a student or community group, NGO, union, coop, mission-based business, etc working on socially just and/or environmentally sustainable trade and want your info posted in a common e-space with a bunch of other groups from across Canada, then send whatever contact info you’re comfortable with (email address, website, phone, etc) and a BRIEF description of your group to activistnotes@gmail.com. (more…)
February 20th, 2008
| Category: Ethical Trading Initiatives
The following event is being held at the University of Victoria (British Columbia).
February 18th, 2008
| Category: Conferences and Events
Third Annual Fair Trade Convergence
Fair Trade and Ethical Purchasing Policies
Trent University, Peterborough, Ontario
Friday - Sunday, February 1 - 3, 2008
This year, our goals are: (more…)
January 24th, 2008
| Category: Conferences and Events, View all posts
A European Commission refusal to delay a ban on battery cages has been welcomed by the Christian Peoples Alliance party, which is urging Christians to begin changing their buying habits by choosing free range poultry. A Commission report says the ban on keeping laying hens in tiny cages should come into effect in 2012 as planned, despite calls from farmers for more time to prepare.
Spokeswoman for the CPA, Sue May said: “If anything, 2012 is still a long time to wait for an end to the appalling cruelty of battery farming. Any delay would have been an outrage to human decency. Now the facts are getting known, it would be great if Christians everywhere took a lead in buying more ethically and choosing free-range chickens and eggs. Collectively, we could make a huge difference. The Bible is emphatically on the side of animal welfare and the requirement to show respect towards all of God’s creation.”
According to official figures, 62% of the UK’s 29 million laying hens are kept in battery cages, while 34% are free range and 4% are kept in barn systems. Across 27 EU countries, an estimated 200 million hens are kept in cages which confine them to a space barely big enough to turn around.
They cannot spread their wings, peck, scratch or perch.
Sue May added: “Channel Four’s Jamie Oliver and Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall are doing a public service in highlighting the appalling conditions in which chickens are intensively raised. Consumers cannot say they didn’t know. ” Marks & Spencer and Waitrose have already stopped selling eggs from
caged hens, and Sainsbury’s, Morrisons and the Co-op have announced plans to phase out the sale of battery eggs.”
Source: CPA
© Independent Catholic News 2008
January 9th, 2008
| Category: Ethical Purchasing in the News, View all posts
Briton finds ethical jewellery good as gold
“Customers don’t realize that one wedding ring weighs 10 grammes and causes three tonnes of toxic waste,” says Greg Valerio, whose company aims to follow fair trade coffee with ethical gold jewellery. A silver-haired anti-poverty and human rights campaigner, he is at the forefront of a fast-growing global market for gold and platinum jewellery which seeks to soothe consumers’ consciences and protect miners from danger and exploitation.
Published in: Globe Investor
January 9th, 2008
| Category: Ethical Purchasing in the News
HARVEY SCHACHTER
Published in The Globe and Mail
January 9, 2008
We all want to buy goods and experiences that are real - authentic - rather than fake. In the same way as we used to turn up our noses at products that were junk, these days many of us spurn products, services, and experiences that aren’t original and genuine (at least as defined in our own eyes).
From wilderness trips, to organic food, to craft beers, to reality TV shows, we seek authenticity.
“No longer content just with available, affordable, and excellent offerings, both consumers and business-to-business customers now purchase offerings based on how well those purchases conform to their self image. What they buy must reflect who they are and who they aspire to be in relation to how they perceive the world - with lightning-quick judgments of “real” or “fake’ hanging in the balance,” James H. Gilmore and B. Joseph Pine II write in Authenticity: What Consumers Really Want. (more…)
January 9th, 2008
| Category: Ethical Purchasing in the News
Published in New Consumer.com
4:30pm, 3rd January 2008
Sarah Dryden writes
From 1 June 2008, the Fairtrade minimum price for Arabica coffee will increase to ensure that farmers continue to receive a price which covers the cost of sustainable production.
Producers will receive a guaranteed minimum price of at least US $1.25 per pound of Fairtrade certified Arabica coffee and US $1.20 for unwashed Arabica coffee, or the market price, if that is higher. In accordance with the Fairtrade model, producer organisations will also continue to receive an additional Fairtrade Premium of 10 cents per pound for investment in community and business improvements. For organic Fairtrade certified coffee an additional minimum differential of 20 cents is applied. (more…)
January 3rd, 2008
| Category: Ethical Purchasing in the News, International
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