I woke last Monday morning to a little face at my hotel window (I was three storeys up!). I reached for my glasses quickly – to see a fawn coloured monkey. That’s how my first day at the World Fair Trade Organisaion annual global meeting in Kathmandu, Nepal, started . . .

Top – Members of the WFTO. I’m in to the right in the orange vintage frock between Professor Sharma of Tara Project, India and Raihan Ali of Swallows Thanapara Bangladesh.
Bottom – Over 500 Fair Traders and Nepalese artisans march the streets of Kathmandu to light candles at the local temple and call for support for Fair Trade.

We have spent the last four days talking about Fair Trade. There are 200 of us from all over the world. Really scary stuff reported from Thailand, Kenya and Nepal about how climate change is affecting them NOW. They are planting rice in dry land, not the usual wet fields typical of Asia because the rains come 6 weeks late – and people here in the Katmandu valley are queuing for two hours a day for a bucket of water! I chatted to our hotel manager and they wont even consider putting up a little note in bathrooms asking people to conserve water – it’s scandalous!

At the conference there are fair trade product design competitions, sessions on how Fair Trade will fare in the global recession (it’s looking good – as more people buy to reflect their values!) and workshops held for each region.
Between sessions I visit local partners to have business meetings and do product development – I’m on the back of a motorbike, the dust and pollution from the street gets stuck at the back of my throat – I can barely talk the next day.

Top – Discussing earthenware and quality standards with a ceramics specialist at a Fair Trade project in Nepal. He is helping the group set up a new kiln and retrain to help them accessinternational markets.
Bottom – The ‘CAJUN’ pan-pacific group at the WFTO conference.
I join the Hawaiian shirt wearing, easy-going ‘CAJUN’ pan-pacific group. The “J” is for Japan, which is where one of the People Tree offices is and then I skip through to the highly disciplined European group to work on policy issues – and get a few odd looks for my bright vintage dress.

Diversity rules at the World Fair Trade Organisation – that’s what I love about it!
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