How Do We Reduce Our Own Footprints?

Hi all – I had an idea and I’m looking for feedback.

Since it is a new fiscal year and we are all committed to keeping to budget and reducing our environmental footprint, I propose that we develop a “footprint budget”.

Expenses for utilities, supplies – paper especially – printer toner, printer rolls etc. could have budget targets for the year. We can take our 2009 budget for these categories and set a reduction goal, which can be measured through monitoring costs savings for different categories. This would be an effective way for everyone to be aware of what they use and save money at the same time.

One example that we have started at West Vancouver, is cutting down paper usage by emailing product information to customers instead of printing it off at the point of sale. We have had success doing this already. This one small change in behavior saves paper, puts the customer onto our email list, allows the customer to save the information on his/her computer, and allows us to begin a dialog about the ways people can begin to save resources in the spirit which fair trade promotes.

We could start this officially April 1st to begin with our Reason 3 – Fair trade protects the environment. I am working on a plan and guide and would be happy to share ideas with anyone who is interested. Let’s do more than more than throw our cardboard into the recycling bin and change a few light bulbs.

Let’s really challenge ourselves to go beyond just talking and start doing.

African Peace Festival

In August 2008, Sarah (a volunteer who soon became our Part-time Sales Associate) and I attended the African Peace Festival.

We brought all kinds of neat trinkets to the Roundhouse in Yale Town, Vancouver.

On display here you can see a Calabash Beaded Rattle, some Cheetah-styled Bracelets from Kenya as well as a terrific Putamayo CD called "Women of Africa".

Canada Day on Granville Island!!!

This year the Broadway Store was privileged enough to be invited to celebrate Canada Day on Granville Island at the Indian Mela Festival.

On the right, as our Japanese intern Seiko and I were promoting Fair Trade Awareness to the public Varia (in the back) was taking care of the business transactions.



Being successful at off-site sales takes a lot of team work and enthusiasm.

It was an excellent opportunity to speak with Vancouver locals about the importance of choosing wisely when shopping by supporting Fair Trade.

What better way to celebrate Canada Day?

Meet My New Friend from Old Delhi!

This is a really sweet young woman that I met who grew up in Old Delhi. I had the good fortune to meet her at the Ten Thousand Villages' Managers Conference that we had in Calgary in May 2008.

Shaista has really great energy. After our meeting in Calgary we actually brought her to Vancouver so that people in our community would have a chance to meet a real live artisan who makes some of the handicrafts that we sell in our stores across Canada.

It is really neat watching her work. Here she is the middle of embroidering tiny beads onto little change purses.

Hand-in-Hand with the Environment

Fair Trade just makes sense because at its most fundamental level it takes into consideration SOCIOLOGICAL factors in determining the bottom-line.

I am so excited to be a part of the Fair Trade movement because it means that I am a part of the solution.

Being involved with Ten Thousand Villages means that I am not only linked to our artisans partners but I am also connected to other industry leaders like Level Ground which is a Direct Fair Trade coffee company. (This is their CEO's wheels to-and-from work which he let me take for a spin when we went on a tour of his roastery in Victoria).

If the World Were a Village

What if we imagined the whole population of the world as a village of just 100 people?

- 61 Asians (21 from China and 17 from India)
- 13 Africans
- 12 Europeans
- 8 from S America, Central America & Caribbean
- 5 from Canada and the USA
- 1 Oceanian
- 52 females; 48 males
- 70 non-whites; 30 whites
- 32 Christians
- 20 Muslims
- 13 Hindus
- 89 heterosexuals; 11 homsexuals

- 59% of the entire world's wealth is in the hands of only 6 pp
- 50 pp live on $2 per day and 25 live on $1 per day
- 15 pp produce more than half of the CO2 emissions
- 25 pp consume more than 75% of the energy
- 18 pp do not have access to nearby clean water
- 40 have no access to adequate sanitation, ie. sewage disposal
- 80 pp live in poor quality housing
- 32 breathe unhealthy polluted air
- 50 pp suffer from malnutrition
- 17 pp are illiterate
- 20 inhabitants control 86% of the GNP and 74% of the telphone lines
- 20 pp have 87% of the vehicles and 84% of the paper in use
- 24 pp do not have electricity
- 9 pp have access to the internet
- only 1 person has a college/university education
- 1 person dies and 3 children are born into the world each year
- the population of the village would be 133 by 2025

Reference:
If the World Were a Village by David J. Smith sku#2310034
United Nations and World Bank Statistics

We Depend on our Volunteers

As a non-profit business, Ten Thousand Villages depends on the imagination, innovation and dedication of over a thousand Canadians who have caught the vision of fair trade.




Volunteers are encouraged to learn as much as possible about our handcrafted products in order to build an appreciation for the people and processes behind them.


Being able to fulfill the mission of Ten Thousand Villages enables talented artisans to provide their families with food, shelter and education.