Greetings and welcome to the home of the Fair Trade University!

We are busily planning the next Fair Trade University for May of 2008. If you would like to be on our email list for future FTU trips, please write to ftu (at) justcoffee.coop. And check out the other Just Coffee delegations.

Join us at a Coffee Tasting/Fundraiser for the trip:

What is FTU?

FTU is the brain-child of some of the folks at Just Coffee Cooperative in Madison, WI. The idea is to create a long-term relationship between Santa Anita Cooperative in Guatemala, and the Madison, Wisconsin community, primarily through college students.

By creating a curriculum to study the Fair Trade Movement, Fair Trade Coffee, and the Coffee Commodity Chain, all while on the ground Guatemala, the FTU seeks to break open traditional notions of how capitalism works and who benefits from it.

By connecting coffee drinkers with coffee growers, FTU offers visitors to Santa Anita a direct connection to farmers dealing with issues such as organic certification, environmentally sustainable practices, the worker-owned cooperative model, and the intricacies of Fair Trade certification.
In the bigger picture, students learn how global financial institutions do not offer sustainable and locally controlled economic development, and explore whether current Fair Trade certification regimes are actually creating an optimal alternative for farmers and for consumers.

2008 Trip

Meanwhile, the next Fair Trade University will take place May 28 through June 7. We'll schedule a report-back to the community for after the trip! For more information, email FTU@justcoffee.coop.

2007 Trip

The first Fair Trade University was held in May of 2007. Check out our photo album. Click on the attachment below for a PDF of Susie Levy's writeup from the 07 trip.