Diocesan Synod has resolved that Lichfield should become a Fair Trade diocese. That means half of all parishes need to be Fair Trade parishes. That in turn means using fairly traded tea and coffee for all meetings, using other fairly traded products and promoting fair trade whenever possible.

    That done (perhaps regularly including trade justice in intercessions, running periodic Traidcraft stalls, coffee mornings, etc.), application forms to register as a Fair Trade parish can be obtained from:

The Fairtrade Foundation,
Room 204,
16 Baldwins Gardens,
London EC1N 7RJ.

Roger Miller, the secretary of the diocesan World Development group, would be very pleased to hear of successes at:
9, The Villas,
Stoke on Trent ST4 5AH
or r.miller365@btinternet.com

    A Fairtrade diocese is a community that has made a commitment to supporting Fairtrade. Making your diocese a Fairtrade community is a very effective way of spreading the word about Fairtrade and through it supporting disadvantaged farmers amd workers in developing countries. The more people buy Fairtrade in the UK, the more people in Africa, Latin America and Asia can trade their way out of poverty.

    You can apply for a Fairtrade certificate from CAFOD for your diocese if the appropriate diocesan meeting agrees to meet five goals:

• to support and promote Fairtrade, further encourage the use and sale of Fairtrade products and to serve Fairtrade tea and coffee at diocesan meetings
• to encourage parishes and deaneries to adopt the same policy and to display literature advertising the fact that Fairtrade products are used and served there
• ensure Fairtrade tea, coffee and other products, if possible, are used and/or sold by more than a third of the parishes in the diocese
• attract media coverage and continue to raise awareness of the Fairtrade Mark
• set up a Fairtrade steering group to monitor that goals continue to be met and developed.