Florida Catholic | Fair Trade Ambassadors

COMMENTARY

Fair-trade ambassadors learn how to improve lives

STEPHANIE BOSSE | SPECIAL TO THE FLORIDA CATHOLIC

Published: 11.16.07

Stephanie Bosse sorts through several "fair trade" crafts designed by artisans in poverty regions throughout the world. Bosse, an intern for the Orlando Diocese Office of Advocacy serves as program coordinator for Catholic Relief Services and was recently commissioned in Tucson, Ariz., as a local fair trade ambassador. As an ambassador, Bosse’s job is to move people in poverty countries from dependancy to development.

Stephanie Bosse sorts through "fair trade" crafts designed by artisans in poverty regions throughout the world. Bosse, an intern for the Orlando Diocese Office of Advocacy, is a program coordinator for Catholic Relief Services and a local fair trade ambassador. As an ambassador, Bosse’s job is to move people in poverty countries from dependancy to development.
MARY ST. PIERRE | FC

Recently, I attended a fair trade ambassador training session offered by Catholic Relief Service in Tucson, Ariz.

The training is a new program offered by CRS, the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops’ international emergency relief agency, and it educates people on what fair trade is and how improving people’s lives through fair trade alternatives is just good stewardship.

Our days at the training were filled with information, storytelling and relationship building, as well as travel across the border to Mexico. When we arrived, our small group, mainly from the Eastern and Southern states, was transported to the midsection of the mountains where 200-plus-year-old blooming saguaro cacti dotted the landscape. The exquisite desert landscape reminded me of the countryside where Jesus spent his life and ministry coming face-to-face with the tragedy of human suffering.

Crossing the border into Sonora, we stopped at a shelter where migrants recently deported from the United States were provided meals and beds on their return to their homeland. Funded by CRS, the Center of Attention for the Migrant Exodus is run entirely by volunteers who have responded with an immediate yes to Jesus’ question to St. Peter so long ago: “Do you love me?”

In the same community we met with a fair-trade coffee-roasting cooperative. Café Justo, translated as “Just Coffee,” boasts the moniker, “caffeine with conscience” and is considered a “Fair-Trade Plus” cooperative because it is fully sustainable, from bean to coffee cup. This 50-member family-run operation grows, harvests, roasts and bags its own coffee.

Meeting Adrian, whose family works at the roastery, was an emotional and heartwarming experience. Their pride in what they do and how they make their living was evident in every word spoken. What amazed me most about the Café Justo tour was that the roastery sits directly next to an automobile dump, and yet the inside of the shop was cleaner than many stores in the United States.

The reality that migrants risk their lives regularly to cross the barren and dangerous desert when more economic opportunities can be made available in their own country was not lost on anyone in our party. Opportunities like the coffee roastery in this border town could be made available to encourage people to stay and improve their lives and those of their families.

Café Justo’s mission statement reinforces this observation: “When there is no work and no prospects, the allure of the job market in the United States is almost irresistible when combined with the direct knowledge of opportunities … in the United States. Just Coffee is focusing on the direct causes of economic migration into the States. We are sure that providing economic incentives to remain on cherished homelands with friends and loved ones will prove much more humane and effective than all the fences, cameras and agents.”

At the conclusion of the whirlwind weekend, our group was commissioned by CRS to be ambassadors, called to spread the good news that there are more humane ways to address the root causes of migration and global poverty through fair-trade efforts and promoting solidarity with all of our brothers and sisters. You, too, can answer Jesus’ question, “Do you love me?” by joining the Fair-Trade Network today by visiting www.crsfairtrade.org and clicking on “Sign Up.”

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