Online registrations are now closed.

Please find the draft programme here.

Should you have any questions on the organisation of the event, please send an email to Alice Sinigaglia, sinigaglia@fairtrade-advocacy.org

The Chair of the European Parliament Committee on International Trade, Bernd Lange (S&D, Germany), and the Vice-Chair of the European Parliament Committee on the Internal Market and Consumer Protection, Dita Charanzova (ALDE, Czech Republic), are pleased to invite you to the conference ‘Promoting sustainable value chains by linking SMEs to Fair Trade producers in the Global South’. The event will take place on 10 May 2017 from 16h30 to 18h30 at the European Parliament in Brussels (room A1E1). It will be followed by a networking Fair Trade cocktail in the Salons (number tbc) from 18h30.

The event will bring together Southern countries’ Embassies, EU and Member States’ policy makers, Fair Trade actors, and SMEs representatives from different EU countries. Speakers will include representatives of the European Commission and the European Parliament, as well the representatives from the Fair Trade movement and EU SMEs (the agenda of the event will be soon available).

Please click here to see the invitation. For more info: sinigaglia@fairtrade-advocacy.org

Background: The 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development places great emphasis on the role of the private sector to address social, environmental and economic challenges. The promotion of ‘fair and ethical trade’ is also included in the EU actions to implement the 2030 Agenda and it is recognised as a strong contribution to sustainable development in the EU proposal for a new European Consensus on Development. Provisions on sustainable development issues and Fair Trade are also included in recent EU trade and investment agreements, as well as some EU autonomous trade preference schemes. According to the current EU trade strategy, these agreements and EU trade policies should also pay particular attention to SMEs that need targeted support to fully participate in international trade. The trade strategy is also ambitious in steering EU trade into a comprehensive strategy beyond market access. In particular, it includes a paragraph on ‘fair and ethical trade’ where it commits to:

1. use the existing structure for implementation of FTAs to promote fair trade and other sustainability assurance schemes
2. address fair and ethical trade more systematically in the review of the EU ‘Aid for trade’ strategy
3. promote through the EU delegations and in cooperation with the High Representative, fair and ethical trade schemes to small producers in third countries
4. gather market data in relation to fair and ethical trade markets
5. launch an ‘EU City for Fair and Ethical Trade’ award.