Fair Trade

A documentary directed by Jean Lefaux, Martine Bouquin.

Synopsis

The gap between the rich and poor coun­tries in the world has dras­ti­cally widened. For the past fif­teen years, some men have decided to take action to strug­gle against this phe­nom­e­non of exclu­sion. Being aware that the char­ity sys­tem is too lim­ited, they have set up the frame­work of a new mar­ket sys­tem. They have thrust them­selves into the “fair” trade adven­ture: pay­ing the pro­duc­ers a fair, wor­thy and steady price. Mas­cao choco­late, made from Boli­vian raw mate­r­ial, is a typ­i­cal exam­ple of this new kind of trade: in less than ten years ElCeibo– an organ­i­sa­tion of lit­tle Boli­vian pro­duc­ers– has been able to build a fac­tory and there­fore become self suf­f­i­cent. The cre­ation of inde­pen­dent labels, like Max Have­laar, has given a new extent to fair trade by includ­ing it into the sys­tem of mass mar­ket­ing. Since then fair trade has kept on growing.