Plenary, 17 Mar 2004

Meeting date: Wednesday, March 17, 2004

Official Report 418KB pdf

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Time for Reflection

Good afternoon. Our time for reflection leader today is Priya Sahi, who is a fifth-year student at Grove Academy in Broughty Ferry.

Good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen. I am here with my fellow fair traders from the fifth year at Grove Academy in Dundee. Since September last year, we have been participating in fair-trade co-operation, which ensures that there will be better wages for producers in third-world countries. We have set up a fair-trade stall that sells different types of sweets and chocolate and which is held regularly at our school.

It all started with the world trade game, which was introduced by Sally Romilly and in which each team represented a different country in the world trade union. From the success of some teams and the constraints on others, the effects of uneven representation among countries became apparent. Those inequalities led to increasing concern about and understanding of the third world countries' plight. At the conclusion of Sally's time at Grove Academy, students were provided with samples of the exceptional quality fair-trade chocolate. Inspired by the lessons—not to mention the exceptionally good chocolate—we set about raising money and awareness for people in those countries.

In November last year, there was a parent-teacher association meeting for which Mrs Beaton, our social education teacher, suggested we have a fair-trade stall selling items ranging from coffee and tea to crafts and—of course—chocolate. Gillian Millar very kindly helped us with the stock. As the evening approached, we were nervous. That was not because we would not sell the items—we are natural sales experts and, being chocoholics, we could eat the chocolate—but because of the fear that our efforts spent establishing the stall might fail. However, it was a success and we raised just over £180. We then decided to try to run the stall selling chocolates and cereal bars at school the following week. That was an opportunity to raise awareness of fair trade among young people as well as the teachers and we raised just over £25. After that success, we continued to hold the stall on a regular basis.

We hope to increase awareness further by talking to the younger year groups and receiving feedback on how we can improve promoting fair trade. We are trying to buy stock for our staff room in order to increase the teachers' awareness and we intend to host a game show and debates and even to have a pyjama day. I know that our ideas seem to be just a little extreme, but it is all for a good cause.

To conclude, we feel that our co-operation with fair trade has already made a difference. We have learned a lot and we hope to continue supporting fair trade both inside and outside the school. We feel that as a nation of prime consumers of commodities such as coffee and chocolate, we should start eating with a clear conscience. By promoting fair trade, long-awaited justice for workers in third-world countries can finally prevail. Thank you. [Applause.]