Hi there BISC blog readers and welcome to this blog on Banana Friday, Xiang Jiau (Mandarin), bananes, (French), bananen, (German) bananels, (Bristol) banana (the rest of the UK!) For banana crazy Friday BISC once again featured on local TV and our slightly mad antics were flashed across the South West of England. Congratulations to those of you who featured on what was no more than a thirty second clip! If you missed it watch it here:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/mediaselector/check/england/realmedia/pointswest/pointswest?size=16x9&bgc=C0C0C0&nbram=1&bbram=1&nbwm=1&bbwm=1&bgc=C0C0C0&nbram=1&bbram=1&nbwm=1&bbwm=1
The Friday banana day including ‘Meal with a Message’ was the climax of fair trade fortnight. The displays and items for sale had been professionally arranged by Mei. Incidentally during this fortnight Xiaomei graduated from Bristol University and celebrated a birthday. Her mum and dad from Shanghais are in Bristol at the moment – they must be proud parents!
For me (John) the Meal with a Message began at lunchtime with sandwiches etc delicately prepared by the Bristol University Christian Union. Thanks guys and God bless you all! During the lunchtime BISC participated in the nationwide banana eating contest and with the TV camera present most nationalities present shouted ‘banana’ very loudly in their own language.
During the evening meal there were about 15 people present where we sat down to a meal followed by an informative talk reinforced by a game by Adam Gardner from the Christian Aid organisation. I had teamed up with Petr from the Czech Republic, who being cleverer than me, was the buyer of cocoa beans and the seller of manufactured chocolate bars. Your truly the Blog master was the production line mass producing chocolate bars. The end result generally left most of us with something to think about and the reasons why organisations such as Fair Trade and Christian Aid exist.
Priye, originally from India, and who now lectures on Political Economy at the University brought some beautiful scarves and jewellery that had been made by refugee women from the Kashmir region of India/Pakistan. These exhibits were stunning and sold for around £15.00. Numerous items were sold during the evening. In London however, similar items retail for about £3.00. Although cheap to us in Britain the £3.00 did not reflect the true cost of their production and the primary producers/manufacturers probably gained nothing for their sale at £3.00. The large supply chain organisations cut out the original manufacturer as they know their powers to bargain are almost nil. Hence the reason for the Fair Trade movement as those items being sold at about £15.00 meant that about two thirds of the cost was returned to the primary producers, in our example these were the women refugees from Kashmir.
All in all, I thought that the Meal with a Message represented a fitting end to Fair Trade fortnight and may the Fair Trade movement continue to expand, and may many more big retail outlets in Britain and elsewhere in the developed world be converted to the principles of fair trade costing, supply chain management and marketing. I’m now off to eat my bananal! See you on the Polish night blog this Wednesday.
