February 2022 - end of month review

This is a bit late as we are already into mid-March, but we had a week away last week so I am playing catch up now. Being almost 2 weeks into March means that I feel like I've forgotten what happened in the shortest month. 

Another reason why the monthly review is hard to write is because events in the wider world took a rather grim turn as Russia invaded Ukraine, prompting the first war in Europe since the early 1990s when Yugoslavia fell apart. I have several thoughts about why this war feels different even to the post 9/11 invasion of Iraq, the long war in Afghanistan or the Syrian civil war. 

There has been a democratisation of war reporting now, with anyone on the ground with a mobile phone supplying footage and commentary. Twitter is full of shaky handheld footage from people in or near the combat zone. This is probably the first war to be livestreamed. It's all very sad and stupid and depressing. 

However it has lifted the lid again on the utter corruption of the UK Government and how easy it has been for Vladimir Putin to purchase the souls of Conservative politicians. It's the ultimate Thatcherite mindset - to put a monetary value on everything. Although Margaret Thatcher would have been horrified to see the way her successors have shilled themselves and her party to malign despots. 

There was a show of solidarity across football crowds with the people of Ukraine. Barry Town fans have long used blue and yellow Ukraine flags as decoration, so it was suddenly sadly relevant to see them being held up by fans at the game against Caernarfon Town at the last game in February.

There were a couple of other notable things about the game. Firstly, the Caernarfon manager had decided to copy the hipster's choice of football manager, Marcelo Bielsa. by sitting on a tub at the edge of his technical area. He got a chant of "Discount Bielsa, you're just a discount Bielsa" aimed at him.

The other was Barry's supporter's rep on the board, Ian, turning up in a suitable costume to celebrate Fairtrade Fortnight.

The free bananas that he was handing out were especially welcome as it was a 12.45 kick off and I hadn't had my lunch yet. (I bought chips from the chip van.)

That game was the final one of six matches I attended in February. Barry had two Friday night games so on the free Saturdays I went to Pontardawe Town near Swansea and to Cambrian & Clydach in Clydach Vale near Tonypandy in the Rhondda. They hadn't updated their match board, but the game was on. 

In the middle of the month, Cathy and I celebrated Valentine's Day by watching the film Singin' in the Rain. I thought I had watched it as a kid, but remembered nothing about it at all apart from the iconic bit where Gene Kelly is dancing along singing in the rain, which I reckon I must have seen as a standalone clip. The film has aged quite well, I felt, with the theme of celebrities faking relationships to keep the gossip industry happy being weirdly up-to-date. 

Then towards the end of the month we had a sudden announcement that something we were planning to attend in Cambridge wasn't happening, so we suddenly had no reason to go and stay over there at the beginning of March. In typical fashion, we had just booked accomodation in Cambridgeshire the day before we were told that we didn't have to go. 

Fortunately, we were able to swap our accomodation for a week in Calstock next to the Tamar River on the border of Devon and Cornwall. I will tell you more about that in my next blog post!

And reason number 10 why Peter Griffiths was wrong…

My good lady wife reminded me of another assertion by Peter Griffiths at The Great Fair Trade Debate which either completely missed the point or was a deliberate misrepresentation (your call).

10) Peter Griffiths claimed that fair trade is about paying higher prices so that some of the money goes to the producer. Again, not quite right. Some fairly traded products are more expensive than unfairly traded equivalents. But then many companies who trade, even in this country, tend to drive the hardest bargain they can. Promising one price, then offering a lower price at harvest time is one classic trick.

But what about those fairly traded products that are cheaper than their equivalents? They do exist. What’s going on there, in Peter Griffiths’ view of the fair trade world?

If fairly traded products do cost more, there are often a number of different reasons for that. Trying to trade across geopolitical trade tariffs and barriers are reasons for higher prices. Simple economies of scale play a part too. Nestle dominate the world coffee market and can drive down their prices if they want to (guess whether they do or not), but they also have their own packaging plants and can fill chartered planes with coffee. They don’t have to pay a third party to have their coffee packaged and transported, so it’s cheaper for them to get the coffee to market.

Plus, ‘fair trade’ is more than just ‘we pay more money’. Yes, sometimes there is a ‘fair-trade premium’. But at its heart, ‘fair trade’ is about sustainable relationships – where the buyers pay the agreed-on negotiated price and don’t try to wiggle out of it later, where long-term trading relationships matter, and where producers are often paid some of the money upfront so they don’t have to go into debt while the crops are growing or the products are being made.

Thinking that ‘fair trade’ is all about money, and not realising that actually it is a life-affirming dynamic, is the kind of error made by the kind of person who doesn’t understand that human beings trade with other human beings – and trade is just one of many human relationships. Or, to put it another way, the kind of person who extrapolates behaviour based on the premise that everyone behaves like automatons, then wonders why there complex models don’t work in the real world. Or, to put it a third way, a person who is a classically trained economist.

And just to set the record straight, because my good lady wife told me I’d got one of my facts wrong, the chap from the Windward Islands wasn’t actually from a co-operative. He was a member of the Windward Islands Farmers Association (WINFA), which works on behalf of the farmers e.g. to get the Fair Trade Mark on their bananas.

But even if he wasn’t from a co-operative, he still (rightly) took offence at Peter Griffiths’ assertion that someone in the developing world would automatically steal if they had the opportunity. But then that statement was based on an anecdote, and according to Peter Griffiths, anecdotes don’t count as evidence…

And finally…
I stood up and said something at the debate, challenging Peter Griffiths on a couple of these things. Obviously when I sat down I thought of several more things I could have said. That always happens.

Anyway, Cath has told me that she met people at a fair trade fair at the weekend who commented that what I said was helpful. When she went into the shop at the weekend, one of her co-workers said that she’d heard I’d stood up and made a good point. Fame.

But my encouragement to you is speak up and speak out in those situations where you just know you have to speak up and speak out.

Take courage, because other people want to, and will love the fact that you have.

And the more of us who do it, the more other people will.

And the brighter we shine, the more we roll the darkness back.

Global warming - the evidence

Driving into work this morning under the M4 bridge and I spotted a giant truck heading west with the words Bristol Fruit Company emblazoned on the side, along with a giant picture of a bunch of bananas.

Since when have bananas grown in Bristol?