Our Story

True Fair Trading CIC is one of two ‘not for profit’ Community Interest Companies established to support the charitable purpose of two foundations, both UK registered charities:

The Fair Earth Foundation and The Atlantic Whale and Dolphin Foundation.

The AWDF has a specific brief to help in the conservation of whales and dolphins in the Atlantic Oceans. Its operating base is in Tenerife, in the Canary Islands, where it runs the volunteer programme on the whale watching boats, one of the top three whale watching destination in the world and it has done so for some 25 years. See www.whalenation.org ​

The Fair Earth Foundation is to be launched at the Chelsea Flower Show in May 2017. Its mission is to work towards the alleviation of poverty around the world through helping people to stand on their own feet and thus empowering them to attend to their own needs be they educational, environmental or enterprise creation. The Fair Earth Foundation provides educational support and training in language, environmental issues, and enterprise development as well as logistical support including micro-financing and volunteer input.

Why we help

Poverty in the modern world is very much a result of the after effects of colonisation in the preceding centuries. Communities were deprived of their traditional means of making a living and mobilised to produce crops and resources for colonial nations, at very low wages and with little benefit to them. When demand changed, or production became cheaper elsewhere, many communities were simply abandoned and left with economies dependent on a single commodity which no longer commanded a market or viable income. 

​Many of these communities still retain their artisan communities, crafts people of extraordinary talent capable of producing product of great beauty but with no way of accessing the ‘global market’. They are also in some of the most beautiful places in the world and often with vibrant and exciting cultures and nature. The solution to their predicament is not to give them charity, cripple them further with dependence but, rather, to give them the means to get back onto their own feet, to become sustainable and independent; they have great assets- in their artisanal production and in their nature and culture.

How we help

True Fair Eco Tourism CIC was developed to facilitate the development of eco-tourism opportunities, travel that benefits local communities as well as tourists by giving them access to real experiences. Tenerife is a beautifully vibrant country, influenced by South American traditions and attitudes and is similarly blighted by mass tourism. Tourism in Tenerife was developed by British, German and Spanish capital with very little benefit accruing to local communities who saw their traditional farming work destroyed by the rising price of water which was diverted to the tourists and such as golf courses. Local work now is in servicing the tourists- guards, maids, drivers, cleaners, cooks. We developed www.whalesanddolphinsoftenerife.org to give tourists insights into a very beautiful island with their monies going to local communities. Tenerife could live off of this type of tourism and all tourists would have an extraordinary colourful experience. Our next website project will be eco-tourism in Sri Lanka, another extraordinary beautiful island- to be launched later in the Autumn 2017.

True Fair Trading CIC was established to give artisanal producers access to global markets. Since its founding in 2012 its main operating base has been garden shows and particularly the RHS shows at such as at Chelsea, Hampton Court, Tatton and Cardiff and,more recently the London based ‘pop up’ RHS shows. Our niche has developed to big garden pots, as one customer described ‘bloody big pots’ and these come from all over the world.

This year we are expanding our brief to include artisanal production in Europe, bringing into the UK beautiful pots and garden artefacts from Spain, France, Greece and, of course, the UK. We will also be branching out from garden shows to landscape and corporate design shows, and from the UK to France in particular. The development of our web sales is also a key goal this year.

Our story will be developed with and through our growing community. Together, we will create the difference we all want to see.