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Fair cotton is cotton that is grown and is certified in accordance with FLO's Fairtrade criteria and has been available since 2005 in the Swedish market. The reason for certifying the cotton is the hard economic and social situation in developing countries where the growers and farmers are located. The reason for this is that many cotton farmers do not have good sales channels and are forced to sell through many intermediaries that take a lot of the profit. Cotton market is also pressured hard when dealing with prices. Today, for example, the world price of cotton, is only a third of what it was in the 80s. In USA, a majority of the cotton producers has also received extensive government subsidies so they can sell their cotton at a cheaper price and this means that many cotton farmers in developing countries will be forced to sell at non-profit prices.
Today there are 16 Fairtrade certified producer organizations, located in India, Egypt, Mali, Burkina Faso, Senegal and Cameroon. Retailers of products containing Fairtrade cotton are at currently, among others:, Jysk, Jack & Jones, La Redoute, Righteous Fashion and Oria. In all these examples it is only the cotton that is Fair - not the final product.
Criteria for cotton Fair
The criteria for cotton follows the Fairtrade Labelling Organization's (FLO) general criteria, including product-specific criteria such as:
- Explicit rules for chemical management, including health promotion
- Guidelines for long term trading relationships
- Indications for a defined minimum price that is always above cost of production and world prices.
- Payment of a premium per kilo of cotton sold to the producer in order to stimulate the development of democracy.