With annual expenditures of more than $2.2 billion consuming
most of its $2.3-billion yearly revenue, UCSD is often forced to sleep with one
eye on its pocketbook. Students typically confront this reality most directly
through living and eating on campus, where the clash between frugality and
emerging social movements such as fair trade underscores a historic challenge
for UCSD Housing, Dining and Hospitality administrators.
Fair trade, a certification process that ensures quality
living conditions for farmers who cultivate products such as coffee, tea and
cocoa, first made an impact on the international economy in the late 1990s. The
burgeoning movement at UCSD — largely initiated by student groups such as
environmental-advocacy organization One Earth, One Justice — began
approximately five years ago. Since then, the student-led push has gradually
expanded fair-trade options on campus, with a majority of the upgrades
happening in the last six months.
Fair-trade-certified items are paid for in advance, guaranteeing
farmers at least their country’s minimum wage for the products they grow. The
increased wages are of critical importance to impoverished farmers in
developing countries, said OEOJ principal member Rishi Ghosh.
“Right now, the options for farmers are either to die of
starvation, or ‘Sell my coffee for 10 cents and die of a little less
starvation,’” Ghosh said.
OEOJ took its fair-trade message to campus leaders as early
as 2005, when the A.S. Council passed a resolution encouraging more widespread
purchase of fair-trade products. The council followed up in 2006 with a
proposal to establish criteria to make UCSD a fair-trade university — meaning
each campus retailer would need to sell two or more fair-trade products in
order to qualify.
The council also implored Chancellor Marye Anne Fox to
create a steering committee for the promotion and oversight of the fair-trade
label, invoking the clause in UCSD’s principles of community that expresses a
commitment to “the highest standards of civility and decency toward all.”
However, university spokeswoman Pat JaCoby said she could
find no evidence that such a committee was ever implemented.
OEOJ has been working with campus administrators, including
those at HDH, for the last four years. In that time, the groups have worked to
incorporate more fair-trade products on campus, a process both parties have
described as laborious and ongoing.
Ghosh argued that administrators have a responsibility to
offer fair-trade products to socially conscious students who are compelled to
eat on campus but do not wish to spend their dining dollars on noncertified
food and beverages.
“I should be able to buy a product which I know wasn’t
produced with slave labor,” he said. “Otherwise, it’s not fair to consumers.”
HDH Associate Director Steven Casad said that while the
campus is committed to human rights and making wise environmental choices,
transitioning UCSD to a completely fair-trade university is impossible because
of its dual responsibilities to its students and the surrounding community.
“It’s our responsibility to offer choices,” he said. “I know
I could go outside to Vons and not buy a fair-trade product because it’s
cheaper, so we really have to offer both. Since we do have fair-trade products
that are being purchased, we have to look at that space on the shelves and say
‘We want you to buy fair trade, but if you’re not buying fair trade, then
something’s got to give.’”
While the cost of certified fair-trade products may be
higher than their counterparts, OEOJ
principal member Daniel Nguyen stressed that proliferation of the fair-trade
process will forge a more sustainable change for developing communities.
“A lot of people are skeptical that buying fair-trade
products will make a difference,” Nguyen said. “But it will make a difference,
because for a country that only makes a thousand dollars a year, buying even
100 of their product makes it possible for the community to invest in primary
education, or even a health facility.”
Currently, Oakland-based nonprofit TransFair
is the only entity that can provide a fair-trade certification for products
imported into the
limiting the number of offerings that meet its strict criteria. Consequently,
fair-trade products are often costly and difficult to obtain in the needed
quantities, Casad said.
Despite these setbacks, UCSD has increased its selection of
fair-trade coffee and chocolate, and in February all of the dining halls
switched to Peet’s fair-trade coffee blend. Varieties of certified chocolate
are also widely available, he said.
While the dining halls require products in varying sizes and
packaging specifications, which may hinder the amount of fair-trade options
available to them, Casad said that HDH uses the convenience-store atmosphere of
Earl’s Place as a testing ground for new, environmentally responsible products.
As HDH expands, it is planning to station a convenience store within each
dining hall, which will open the door to increased product options in the
future, he said.
Earl’s Place Manager Cathryn Fernandez, whom Ghosh and
Nguyen described as “very progressive,” said she finds the fair-trade movement
invigorating, and frequently visits trade fairs with other HDH employees in
search of newer and more sustainable products.
“It’s a good avenue of education as far as exercising your
power through consumerism,” she said. “There are a lot of students who don’t
know the difference between fair trade and organic, but there are those who do,
which is exciting because it’s a way to flex your power.”
Fernandez said that Earl’s Place offers more than 65
fair-trade-certified products in total, though around 40 are varieties of tea
that rotate based on available shelf space. She said that while she enjoys
attending trade fairs to locate new products, she has to be cautious of vendors
trying to disguise uncertified products as fair trade due to the movement’s
popularity.
For some students, like
junior Stephanie Lim, abuse of the term has made her somewhat skeptical of
products claiming to be fair-trade certified.
“I’m not saying that the term ‘fair trade’ is bad, but it is
misleading,” Lim said. “The term is much too liberally applied and exploited by
large companies to increase their profit margins. I believe we should be
skeptical and discerning when we make a fair-trade purchase. If we’re going to
make an effort to buy something environmentally and socially beneficial, we
should assure that it is genuine and not just to soothe our consciences.”
Ghosh and Nguyen expressed a similar attitude toward improper
labeling, and said that OEOJ is careful to watch for these problems, especially
within UCSD.
For example, they said a student employee at one of the
dining halls approached them at a recent meeting to voice concerns over
labeling practices she viewed as deceptive. According to the employee, the
fair-trade coffee decanter was filled with nonfair-trade coffee when they had
run out of the former product.
“From our experience, the dining halls certainly do not
adequately train their employees about fair-trade certification, if they do at
all,” said OEOJ principal member Chris Westling.
Casad disputed the claim, saying the situation could not
have happened because all coffee on campus is now fair-trade certified. In
addition, he said that the individual facilities’ managers are expected to
understand the definition of fair trade and the basic information necessary to
educate their employees on the topic.
“We train those people who are doing the coffee,” he said.
“When you have 700 employees, you’re always going to have someone give you a
different answer.”
Despite these issues, Casad said that HDH’s relationship
with OEOJ has been largely positive, and recommendations made in the group’s
most recent proposal are either already in place or under consideration.
Due to the ongoing nature of the fair-trade certification
process, Casad said he is optimistic about the new opportunities that UCSD will
be afforded in the future.
“A lot of our focus and the direction we are looking for in
this coming year is directed by sustainability and fair-trade issues,” he said.
“Just as a human being, it’s important to want everybody to be treated fairly.
If there’s anything we can do as Americans, or the
of
support that, I think we want to make that statement.”
