A Better Spice Trade: Why There's a Growing Market For Fair Trade Spices
These days, consumers are becoming more curious about where their food comes from. A lot of shady things go down in the food industry, and people are not happy about it. This is sparking a growing demand for fair trade goods that support sustainable growing and trading practices for social and environmental reasons. So, while the market for fair trade items such as coffee and chocolate has opened up, it looks like spices seem to be next on the horizon.
What Is Fair Trade
Fair trade helps producers in growing countries achieve sustainable and equitable trade relationships. It secures the rights of marginalized producers and workers in developing countries so that these individuals always have a basic safety net against poverty. A product with the "Fair Trade" mark, means that producers and businesses have met internationally agreed standards be independently certified.
The Complicated Nature Of The Current Spice Trade
The brutality and inequality in the spice trade is still very prevalent. The spices you're buying from the supermarket aren't from one farm or even one region. Most likely, these spices are a result of the work of hundreds, even thousands of farmers from around the globe. Big manufacturers will collect and consolidate spices from many small farmers and then export this spice mixture to big countries in the West. Once imported, there's an additional complicated process. A big importer sells to a big distributor (or several) from which they will either repackage or break down the spices to sell to smaller distributors. It's a complicated, unsustainable process in a many ways. As a result, more businesses are focusing on fair-trade, single-source spices.
Taste The Difference
Fair-trade, single-source spices are not only important for ethical and environmental reasons, but for the taste and quality of the product as well. Small batch, ethically produced spices are harvested within a year, and don't spend years getting passed through a million hands. This means these spices have more robust flavor than conventional spices in the supermarket.
Our Passion For Sourcing
At Colorado Spice, we take sourcing very seriously. We look all around the world for top notch spices that we can use for our spice blends, and pride ourselves on choosing single-source spices from small farmers. We are serious about where we source because we want to help create a better spice trade that supports hard working farmers, is sustainable for the planet, and results in high-quality spices that we can provide our customers. To read more about the spice industry click here.
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