Fairtrade America’s 2024 Highlight Reel
Another momentous year for Fairtrade America! Executive Director Amanda Archila reflects below on the accomplishments of 2024:
As I reflect on all that Fairtrade America has achieved in 2024, I am particularly proud of the connections we strengthened and stories we shared from the more than 2 million farmers and workers who are the foundation of Fairtrade’s global work.
Fairtrade America’s primary charge to support these farming communities is to partner with more businesses and grow the number of Fairtrade Certified products sold in the US. Our team is pursuing that work with creativity and passion – we added 570 new Fairtrade products for US shoppers this year alone, and we have more groundbreaking partnerships to announce in 2025!
But these results would not be possible without the leadership of the people who grow our coffee, cocoa, bananas and hundreds of other vital products. The tremendous dedication, vision and innovation of Fairtrade farmers and workers ensures that Fairtrade certification isn’t simply a transaction or a label, but rather a true partnership that seeks to overhaul a system of trade that’s rested for too long on exploitation.
I was lucky enough to personally spend time this year walking grocery stores of Chicago with coffee farmers from Honduras, speaking with hundreds of banana farmers and workers at the Fairtrade Banana Forum in Santa Marta, Colombia, and celebrating with shoppers and partners in Denver as we revealed a stunning mural of Salamatu Katta, a cocoa farmer from Sierra Leone. These are the people who drive our mission, and we are more passionate and committed than ever to work with them for a fairer future for all.
Highlights of 2024 at Fairtrade America
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We walked the aisles of grocery stores with Fairtrade coffee farmers.
This year at the Specialty Coffee Association’s annual Expo, members of our team organized field trips with Fairtrade coffee farmers to visit a handful of Chicago grocery stores where we learned together about US market realities and opportunities for them to grow the Fairtrade movement.
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We saw income-diversification projects flourishing.
While participating in the Fairtrade Cocoa Forum in Côte d’Ivoire, our staff was invited to tour an attiéké processing facility–an income diversification project run by women at KAPATCHIVA, a Fairtrade cooperative. As climate change continues to jeopardize cocoa harvests, income diversification is an increasingly crucial adaptation to weather the seasons financially when cocoa harvest is low.
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We saw the fruits of the Fairtrade Premium invested by banana workers in Colombia.
The Fairtrade Banana Forum brought together farmers, importers and retailers and Fairtrade staff to discuss the challenges and innovative solutions in banana production today. While attending, members of our team were able to visit local cooperatives to celebrate the ways they’ve invested their Fairtrade Premium funds. A key area of focus was investing in better soil health on farms and also supporting youth, including new sports courts, establishing a dance group and creating an extracurricular soccer school.
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We got more than 1 million eyes on Fairtrade during Fairtrade Month!
We celebrated Fairtrade Month with hundreds of partners, from retailers to brands to shoppers, closing the gap between the products we buy every day and the farmers who grow their ingredients!
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Fairtrade farmer Elder Romero spoke at Innovation Forum’s Future of Food and Beverage Conference.
Farmer voices are critical voices to any conversations about how we build resilient supply chains. That’s why we were so glad that Elder Romero, a Fairtrade coffee farmer from Honduras, was able to travel to Minneapolis this May to share his insights with food and beverage industry leaders at the Future of Food and Beverage USA conference.
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Farmer Mariana Cobos visited her mural in Philly.
Mariana Cobos is an Ecuadorian banana farmer with the Fairtrade Cooperative ASOGUABO. We featured her in our 2023 Fairtrade Month mural at Riverwards Produce, and this spring she chose to visit Philadelphia so that she could see her mural in-person with her family at Riverwards Produce!
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We connected with one of our newest featured mural subjects, Ibu Rahmah.
We featured Ibu Rahmah in this year’s Fairtrade Month mural in Buffalo, NY, and we were so excited when Adam Thatcher, CEO of Grace Farms Foods, offered to bring a mural print to her when he visited Ketiara Cooperative in Indonesia this October!
Photo courtesy of Grace Farms Foods. Photo credit to Siddhartha Joshi.
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NBC traveled to Ghana to interview farmers Daniel and Ataa.
Daniel Amponsah and Ataa Gifty are members of Asunafo North Municipal Cooperative Cocoa Farmers Union. They were in conversation with NBC anchor, Zinhle Essamuah, about the climate realities they face–and the solutions they are prepared to implement as Fairtrade cocoa farmers. We were so grateful to see this piece air on Thanksgiving Day on the NBC Evening News with Lester Holt!
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Fairtrade America partners with brands on the journey to certification and beyond. We can help with everything from finding a certified supply chain to marketing your newly certified product.
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