Go Bananas

In an attempt to set a world record for eating Fairtrade bananas in a single day, hundreds of thousands of people in the UK and Ireland will “Go Bananas!”, eating one Fairtrade banana each between noon on 6 March and noon on 7 March.

Planned events include banana afternoon teas, banana school events, bars serving banana cocktails, banana dancing, banana plays and banana fishing games, and over 200,000 people have reportedly signed up.

Fairtrade co-ordinator and languages teacher Liz Kingsley commented: “We are taking part in the Go Bananas! event because we think it’s a fun way to get across the serious message.”

The Fairtrade Foundation has launched a new report entitled “Unpeeling the banana trade”, which reveals the true cost of cheap bananas and unfair trade rules. “In the UK,” the Foundation said in a press release, “between 2002 and 2008, the price of loose conventional bananas has been cut dramatically in a series of price wars by big supermarkets. The research shows the impact is felt somewhere along the supply chain. It is usually the growers who are often forced to sell their fruit for very little, often less than it cost them to grow.”

In the UK, where one in four bananas sold is now Fairtrade, retailers Tesco, Waitrose, Asda and Sainsbury’s have stuck specially designed Go Fairtrade bananas! stickers on all bagged Fairtrade bananas since the beginning of Fairtrade Fortnight.

A major aim of the Fairtrade Foundation’s five-year strategy, Tipping the Balance, is to double the number of Fairtrade bananas in the UK by 2012, in an effort to help more banana farmers and workers to benefit from the Fairtrade system.