[TestifyToLove]

Starbucks still buys on the same market as companies such as Nestle, Johnson & Johnson, and Proctor & Gamble. They are extremely resisitive to complying with accepted norms for Fair Trade and instead developed their own program which only exists in one or two places, only filters into ONE label of their coffees and is NOT recognized Fair Trade.

No one can understand why Starbucks insists upon this and it is one criticism I actually hold against the company. Growers in several countries petitioned Starbucks to enter Fair Trade and consumers have petitioned for the same, yet they refuse. There is a REASON you need to look for Fair Trade labeling on products. There are only 2 Fair Trade organizations that truly check to make sure it is FAIR TRADE and not merely a label put onto a product to raise prices.

Starbucks is not fair trade. Whatever they are claiming in their own program only applies to that one program AND there is no oversight to it. There is NO indepdent party that has looked at whatever this alternative they claim is actually doing. Unless you are purchasing that one label, then it's not even that program. It's just open market coffee if it's not that program.