Reader Challenge Winner: Fight Slavery Now

by avra cohen · 2009-08-18 05:30:00 UTC
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A couple weeks ago, Jenn over at The Human Trafficking Project and I teamed up and challenged you all to find the 10 most slave-free versions of some common consumer goods.  We are happy to announce FightSlaveryNow.Org sent us the winning list (finding 8 out of 10), which is now published here and at HTP.

Our organization, FightSlaveryNow.Org, has been investigating products untainted by modern-day slavery in order to choose a worthy recipient on whom to bestow our "Freedom Seal".  Since we had a head start on many of these product categories, I thought this would be a challenge easily met. It was not. But it has been fun and enlightening.  First, it engendered a hot discussion of what is meant by 'Free Trade' and the merits and limitations of that designation.  As one site noted: "Bringing about fairness is not easy, and will need much more substantial change than our merely choosing a different brand of coffee..."  Additionally we learned a lot about some products not readily associated with slave labor, such as flowers and lip gloss.  For some products it was easy to find a large selection of Fair Trade alternatives, while for other products there were few or none.   

For the most part we have tried to 'spread the love' and offer a wide variety of websites rather than falling back on a few mega-sites offering many of the items on your lists.  We have also tried to steer readers to the original makers where possible.  Secondary criteria in our selections, besides being 'Fair Trade' or otherwise presumed to be slave free, were eco-sustainability and freedom from animal cruelty.  Hence leather wallets were not considered as many other innovative choices were found.  In the case of similar products, we tried to choose those vendors who seemed to have the most worthwhile charitable need, or the most progressive company policy for supporting social justice issues. Thanks to both Jenn Kimball and Amanda Kloer for your wonderful and informative work, and for bringing us this eye-opening challenge.

  1. Couch, plus two alternatives

  2. Stereo

  3. TV

  4. Flowers, but with some interesting controversy

  5. Rug

  6. Lamp

  7. Rice

  8. Curtains

  9. Coffee Table  

  10. Coffee

Honorable mention:  For the widest array we found of Fair Trade products from peanut butter, tahini, and coconut beer, to underwear,
socks, and baby bibs, check out Ethical Superstore.

Image from blogs.fairplex.com

avra cohen
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