The New York Times recently published an article about the plight of women in Pakistan, focusing in particular on the story of Saima Muhammed – a woman who failed to produce male children for her out-of-work husband. Despite the fact that we know men are genetically responsible for determining the sex of a child, Saima’s husband took out his frustrations on her and beat her – along with threatening to take a second wife. In Pakistan, this is culturally acceptable and in line with the laws and codes that stratify the society, keeping women firmly under the thumb of men in the country.

Using a microloan from the Kashf Foundation, Saima was able to get back on her feet, pay off her husband’s debts, and start a small business. Now, there is no doubt as to who is in charge of the household, and Saima’s husband works for her.

It’s this kind of success story that makes everything we do worthwhile. Through our micro-credit loan program, we enable people who would normally be denied a loan to get back on their feet and move forward. The amount of money that these people require is but a pittance to most of us; all it takes is someone willing to listen. The Fair Trade system does not discriminate when it comes to who we have stitching our sports balls for us; the third-party certification teams make sure that we employ just as many women as we do men and that they both receive a good living wage.

It’s good to see a large paper with a huge readership like the New York Times paying attention to this cause, but there’s still a lot of work to be done!

I get that question alot.

Here’s a new diagram I prepared recently for my MBA students and to present at University of Notre Dame’s business school. The goal was to explain on a single 8.5 x 11 piece of paper the entire company, from eco certifications to our charitable donations.

For those December weddings, don’t forget the green groomsmen gifts.

The folks at the Green Bride Guide recently endorsed us, particularly as favors or gifts for the athletes in the wedding party. Take a moment to look over their guide; it makes for interesting reading even if you are not planning a wedding!

…it will be more fun than you can shake a stick at.

Really.

Thanks goodness for Google Alerts, since I would not normally be hanging out on this posh website!

Just Luxe, a website dedicated to providing a portal for well-heeled folks to find out about anything and everything luxurious, reviewed and recommended our Fair Trade sports balls in their “Top Toys for Posh Tots” article. Hey, cool! Just because someone is wealthy doesn’t mean that they can’t care about the environment and human rights issues like everyone else.

It’s good to see that a site like Just Luxe is embracing Fair Trade Sports, and hopefully other companies with similar goals.

As you may already know, I teach the Marketing class at the Bainbridge Graduate Institute here on Bainbridge Island in Washington state. BGI is an unique school, dedicated to preparing students to build businesses that are socially responsible and environmentally sustainable. Their goals go hand-in-hand with Fair Trade Sports.

Recently, BGI received accreditation from the Accrediting Council for Independent Colleges and Schools (ACICS). Accreditation is a huge step for any new educational program; it establishes BGI as a leader of sustainable business education. Now that BGI is accredited:

•       Our students can receive Title IV Federal financial aid
•       More employers will reimburse some or all of tuition
•       Employers will place more value on the BGI degree
•       Funders will see BGI as an even more attractive investment
•       Other schools will be more interested in copying the BGI model

All of these perks are great, but the last one in particular really stands out to me. If more colleges and universities across the country and the world follow the BGI model, that means that there will be more graduates entering the workplace with an eye towards creating enterprises that are environmentally sustainable and socially responsible, which is much needed. Congrats BGI!

Brazia is 20 years old, unmarried and has been stitching soccer balls in the Chagelan stitching center (which lies a few miles out of Sialkot, Pakistan) for a year. She likes Punjab music and enjoys practicing dancing with her sisters. Brazia enjoys stitching, as she has fun chatting with her friends, but would like to make more Fair Trade soccer balls.

A non-Fair Trade soccer ball, for example, only pays Brazia 30 Rupees, but a Fair Trade soccer ball pays her 47 Rupees, which she says is a good price. Brazia complains that Fair Trade orders are too infrequent, and asks us to ensure we get more order for Fair Trade balls. Our representative on the visit told her we’re working on it.

She doesn’t want to stitch footballs forever, but is planing on taking out a micro-credit loan so that she can open a grocery store with her five sisters.

With Brazia, we can see all our initiatives coming together in one person. She is a female, adult stitcher in Pakistan making a good, living wage. She has enough confidence in herself and the opportunities she has to consider taking out a micro-credit loan so that she can start her own business.  A few years ago, this would have been considered an impossible task, but today it is within her reach.

Well done, Brazia!

October 16 marks the beginning of this year’s End Poverty Now! three day campaign. Please help us spread the word far and wide by forwarding this excellent video.

I just wanted to take a moment to welcome our new Canadian distributor, Zold Eco-Sales Agency, into the Fair Trade Sports fold.

Zold (Hungarian for “green”) prides itself on providing eco-products for Canadians. We recently sealed the deal with Zold (formerly Eco-Alberta); I have a high degree of trust that they will represent our brand well to Canadian retailers and citizen consumers.

So if you are among the Canadian Fair Trade Sports fans that we hear from each week, head on over to Zold. If you want to carry our sports balls in your shop, they can set you up with what you need.

Mark McIntosh recently posted an insightful piece at Grist.com addressing the oft-ignored issue of professinal sports and their impact on the environment.

Grist is a site that’s all about “shining a beacon in the smog” and educating people about what the movers and shakers in our world are doing to help or hinder our environment, and it’s nice to see this issue – one obviously important to us – being addressed with such passion.

Mark asks the questions: who do we hold responsible and where does it all start? Obviously someone has to take that first step and start thinking about the carbon footprint that professional sports and its many tangential businesses have on the environment. Whereas large companies in other fields have begun to address this issue, major league sports teams for the most part have failed to take any sort of action. We the fans can put pressure on them, sure, but there has to be some sort of sea change at the league level for individual teams to take the issue seriously.

It’s a symbiotic relationship we have with the pro sports teams we love to root for; they need us to pay for their athletes’ exorbitant salaries, and we need them for the visceral entertainment the thrill of competition provides. To wit, it really needs to be a joint effort to get the ball rolling (bad pun, sorry).