As International Women’s Day 2022 draws near, we wanted to celebrate the incredible – and often unrecognised - work done by women around the world to make our business possible.

At Ethical Edit, we choose to partner with Fairtrade because we know that they have systems in place to encourage female empowerment, participation and decision-making in developing countries. Not only are they ensuring that women farmers get paid fairly and are given a voice, they’ve also developed specialised programmes to encourage women into leadership roles.

True to our ethical beliefs, we source Fairtrade cotton, because it creates fairer opportunities for all farmers and producers, especially for women.

Cotton is a heavily traded agricultural commodity that plays a major role in the economic and social development of developing and newly industrialised countries. As many as 100 million rural households – 90 per cent of them in developing countries – are directly engaged in cotton production, relying on it for their income.

One of the ways Fairtrade farmers are trying to address poverty is by increasing the skills of the women in their communities. In celebration of International Women’s Day, and our partnership with Fairtrade, we’re celebrating the many enlightened and ethical suppliers we work with – who are actively empowering and enhancing women’s lives for the better.

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Fairer communities. Fairer loans. Fairer education.

We’re proud to work with many inspirational women and businesses who are on a mission to improve lives of thousands of artisan women and their families.

People like Sonica Sarna, an incredible Indian woman who runs an ethical design and production company with a focus on creating a positive impact, both socially and environmentally. By engaging artisan workers in communities across India, she aims to actively improve the lives of those living on the poverty line and create a far-reaching socio-economic impact that will last for generations.

Another is Chetna Organics, a ground-breaking Indian co-operative that’s 100% owned by over 35,0000 smallholder farmer/ producers. Among their many initiatives to help cotton farmers have fairer, better lives, Chetna operates a ‘Seed Guardians’ programme, which aims to create income and generate work for women farmers, and to diversity and preserve local varieties of edible crops.

Chetna has also adopted several Government-run boarding schools, such as Ashram Tribal Girls School, a primary school in Utnoor, which has 340 students, so they’re making a difference to women’s lives from the start of their lives.

As we know, when women are empowered, the whole society benefits – with less poverty, more food and more education. These are the cornerstones of why we choose Fairtrade and they’re also essential elements to a fairer world. A world we want to be part of.

Thank you to our amazing, ethically-conscious clients and partners for helping to make this fairer future a reality.