Whole Foods signs up new fairtrade certifier

The Institute for Marketecology (IMO) will be one of three third-party certifiers for the Whole Trade Guarantee program at Whole Foods, which aims to help end poverty in developing countries through the payment of honest, respectable prices for products headed for its stores. The IMO said its Fair For Life certification program offers the prospect of fairtrade certification to an array of materials and products for which it previously did not exist, including multi-ingredient products and wild harvested produce. IMO said: “Many important commodities from genuine fairtrade projects in developing countries can presently not be certified under the system adopted by the Fairtrade Labeling Organization since FLO has not yet developed the respective product standards. “Examples include olive oil from the West Bank and Israel, coconut oil from Asia and Africa, palm oil from Africa, apples from small-scale farmers in remote areas of South America, and most aromatic plants used in cosmetics and nutritional food.” The Fair For Life certification, which was introduced in 2006, is part of the IMO Social & FairTrade Programme and is based on several sets of key baseline standards, such as the ILO conventions, FLO Fairtrade standards, SA8000, and IFOAM Social Criteria. It says that it allows for “meaningful certification” of multi-ingredient products by using content rules that are modeled after those for organic products and by reviewing all critical steps in the value chain. Companies with Fair for Life certification are also offered incentives for continuous improvement of social and trade conditions. The ILO said Fair For Life was a “ brand neutral, third-party certification program for social accountability and fairtrade to complement existing fairtrade certification systems”. Logos and labels The Fair Trade Federation of North America offers guidance on how to know if a particular product or business is fair trade. It states: “There are two types of organizations involved in fair trade. Some certify specific commodities, regardless of to whom they are sold; others screen organizations for their full commitment to fair trade, regardless of what products they sell. “Member organizations of the Fair Trade Federation usually display the FTF logo on their business materials, are listed on the FTF website, and may have the words “Member of the Fair Trade Federation” on their products. “The Fairtrade Labelling Organization and its North American affiliates, TransFair USA and TransFair Canada, allow their label on the products they have certified.”

Whole Foods signs up new fairtrade certifier

Whole Foods Market is turning to an alternative fairtrade certifier which claims to open certification up to a host of products that are not covered under the Fairtrade Labeling Organization (FLO).

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