Fair Trade Week Features Marketplace, Locally Sourced Dinner and More

Fair Trade Week returns to campus with activities for faculty, staff and students, including the annual marketplace, a locally sourced dinner, and a lunch-and-learn event featuring the director of a Malawi-based clothing company.

Scheduled from Monday, Nov. 30, through Thursday, Dec. 3, Fair Trade Week was originally founded by hosts Spiritan Campus Ministry in 2003 as a way to spread awareness about fair trade practices and to offer ways to support those in developing countries who work to support themselves and their families.

“The guiding theories of Fair Trade (dialogue, transparency and respect) promote ethical business practices and are targeted at lifting up the most marginalized in our global society,” explained Spiritan Campus Minister Kate Lecci. “Fair Trade business practices work in solidarity with those on the margins to address root causes of poverty and labor atrocities around the world. These are issues which we are called to address and support as a Catholic Spiritan community.”

The Fair Trade Week activities are as follows:

• Nov. 30 to Dec. 3, 10 a.m. to 3 p.m., PNC Atrium, Duquesne Union
  Fair Trade Marketplace: featuring fair trade and ethically sourced products from all over the world from Pittsburgh-based vendors
• Nov. 30, 6:30 p.m., Power Center Ballroom
  Fair Trade Panel Discussion and Locally Sourced Dinner: panelists/fair trade vendors include Amy Sobkowiak, founder/owner of Women of the Cloud Forest (Costa Rica and Nicaragua) and Anna Hansen, a Duquesne student working with the Ladies of Charity project Women’s Co-Op in Uganda. The locally sourced dinner will include a raffle to win fair trade products at the event. Space is limited: RSVP to leccik@duq.edu.
• Tuesday, Dec. 1, noon, Africa Room, Duquesne Union
  Fair Trade Lunch and Learn (Libermann Lunch): speaker Eileen Roberts, founder and director of nonprofit THREEafrica, will discuss how she developed her organization and the triumphs and challenges she has faced. THREEafrica works to engage, educate and empower women in Malawi, Africa, to provide a life for themselves and their families. RSVP to calorie@duq.edu.

Supporting the Fair Trade movement has grown and evolved on Duquesne’s campus throughout the years, according to Lecci. “Support and awareness has grown among students, staff and faculty, and our Fair Trade week changes based on what is currently going on in the movement,” said Lecci. “For a few years, we did a Fair Trade fashion show featuring fair trade clothing from a variety of vendors. In the last few years, the domestic Fair Food movement in Immokalee, Fla., has become more prominent, so we incorporated Fair Food information into our events.

“This year, we’re hosting the locally sourced dinner for students featuring local Fair Trade vendors as panelists to tell stories of people they work with in developing countries,” Lecci added. “Fair Trade Week is about creating an awareness about your purchasing habits. It’s about taking the time to think about where your food, clothing, knickknacks and more come from and the dignity of people who helped to make that product.”

In conjunction with Fair Trade Week 2015, members of the campus community can stop by locations in the Union and Gumberg Library to sample fair trade chocolate and coffees through tomorrow, Nov. 19.

All Fair Trade Week activities are free. For more information on Fair Trade Week, contact Spiritan Campus Ministry at 412.396.6020 or visit their Facebook page.