I recently was browsing YouTube looking at a few fair trade videos, where some economists ( funded by? Who knows) argue basically that fair trade actually has no impact or a destructive impact because:
1) To get verified and certified takes money and resources, so only the richer of the poor people get helped
2) it’s only the richer of the poor countries that end up with any gains
3) in coffee at least, it’s the retailers in the rich countries that capture most of the profits, as is evidenced by the fact that retailers promote it the most.
4) as producers get certified, they produce more, and because they produce more, the wages and prices get depressed anyway, which again leaves the poorest countries and people in even worse shape than before.
Because of the import export, broker, wholesale, retailer systems that we have, the producers can only get a small fraction better, but I still think fair trade is a step in the right direction. Then I found a story and documentary of an extremely poor tribe that were able to really take fair trade to the next level it’s quite interesting