Fairfood Friday #74

Every Friday we round up the most interesting, inspiring or funny stories we came across while conducting research for our news stories. This week: Starting this October is the 9th annual Fair Trade Month. In recognition of this month, Fair Trade USA have come up with 10 simple actions you can take to celebrate and support this month, helping farmers and workers alike in developing countries. Which action will you take?

Have you read something we should know about? Please let us know in the comments.

10 Easy Ways to Celebrate Fair Trade Month in October
Simple actions that will make a big difference for farmers and workers around the world.

World Food Day: helping smallholder farmers to share knowledge
Farming co-operatives in developing countries are enabling smallholder farmers to share knowledge and pool resources, helping to alleviate poverty and hunger.

Everyone Eats There
California’s Central Valley is a great food source. So why is it being treated so badly?

Green Crude: The Quest to Unlock Algae’s Energy Potential
A host of start-up companies are pursuing new technologies that they claim will soon lead to large-scale commercialization of biofuels made from algae. But questions remain about the viability and environmental benefits of what its developers are calling “green crude.”

Can Facebook Activate a Billion Consumers to be Green?
What if you had the opportunity to engage a billion people around sustainability? What issues would you choose? What messages would you impart? How would you leverage the opportunity to affect behavior change at scale?

Seed diversity: a global route to food security? – in pictures
Many farmers’ livelihoods depend on the ability to save seed varieties. ‘Farmers breed for resilience,’ says Dr Vandana Shiva, who is leading a campaign supported by the Gaia Foundation to protect seed diversity and promote food security. ‘They don’t breed one crop. They know they must have many crops because the climate changes … and because nutritional needs are diverse’.

Vote for the Dinner Party
Is this the year that the Food Movement finally enters politics?

How Amul Turned India into the World’s Largest Milk Producer – Sustainably
How IT is helping address issues of sustainability – from energy use to economic development to everything in between.

Dirkje Koene is a Copywriter for Fairfood International.

Image: Br3nda (CC License)