Consumer Ethics

Using Your Consumer Power: How to Shop Ethically

What does it mean to be a consumer in an increasingly globalized world? It means you have POWER! Power to affect change with every purchasing decision you make.

In this age of economic globalization, our actions as buyers affect the global market and people in other places that are part of that market. It’s not always easy to recognize those connections. For instance, a label on a jacket that says Made in Fiji, often disguises the fact that while the jacket was sewn in Fiji, the zipper was made in the Philippines, the material cut in Sri Lanka, the Velcro produced in China, and the package assembled in Vietnam.

Often, consumer products have their manufacturing carried out and/or the resources for their construction extracted in some of the world’s poorest countries, where labour is cheap, and environmental regulations lax. The Pacific is no exception. Here’s how it works:

1. Country A is desperate for some foreign capital (that’s U.S. cash with which it can buy goods on the world market)
2. Country B has a business looking to increase its profit
3. Country A makes a deal with the business from Country B, offering it infrastructural development (a building, electricity, roads, water), along with all the labour and resources it can possibly need, in return for the provision of jobs to a region desperately in need
4. Country A, in its desperation, often waves labour laws, forbidding unionizing and allowing minimum wage and overtime regulations to be ignored
5. In the name of competition, the business from Country B sets up shop, justifying its actions to investors and stakeholders by pointing to the ever-profitable bottom line
6. Conclusion: Country A’s government is Country B’s multinational’s dream come true, offering lax environmental regulations (after all, filtration and proper waste disposal do cost money), very low taxation rates, and an often relocated population working (and even living) in the factories. And so, a population of desperate urban poor is created.

Small island nations of the South Pacific are among those feeling the effects of this pattern of foreign investment. Although aimed at increasing wealth and living standards in a country by bringing the country into the international cash economy, in practice foreign investment has often involved the devastation of local economies, and social and environmental collapse.

Take, for example, the story of mining companies in the Pacific. Many parts of the Pacific are rich in minerals like copper and gold, and foreign companies, at the urgings of national governments, have stepped in to help themselves. The environmental, social, economic and political impacts of these operations have been hotly debated for decades, and indeed have been the source of considerable civil conflict. Many mines import their senior workers from their home country, and local people see no benefit in terms of skills enhancement or meaningful work. Much has been written about the impacts of foreign mining operations such as Louisiana-based company Freeport McMoRan’s infamous mine in West Papua.

So, what’s this got to do with you? Well, as a consumer of the products created in the global economy, you have the power to affect change. Use your consumer power for all it’s worth! Here’s what you can do:

Get Informed

The Pacific Network on Globalization (PANG) and its sister-organization, the Ecumenical Centre for Research, Education and Advocacy (ECREA) is a Fiji-based, regional organization tasked with documenting the impacts – positive and negative – on Pacific islanders of new trading agreements and patterns in the region. Among the phenomena that PANG is examining is the opening of economies to foreign investors – that is, to multinational fishing, mining, forestry and tourism operations, in particular. PANG is a great place to kick start a little critical thinking about the phenomenon now commonly known as globalization. Email PANG at pang@ecrea.org.fj and see how you can learn more and support some of its excellent work. And check out the New Internationalist special issue on the Pacific for a look at some of these operations.

You can also visit the website of the Canadian-based, Maquila Solidarity Network, one of the world’s best resources on sweatshop labour and how to take action.

Support the global union movement.

In many developing nations there are no unions to protect workers, and companies rarely spend money on maintaining health and safety standards. Wages are desperately low, workdays despairingly long and workers can’t refuse overtime, and don’t get paid overtime wages for this work. Much like the "company store" system that was in place in mines in North America in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, wages are not high enough to even purchase the necessities of life. Workers are often so indebted to the company for room and board or for goods purchased from on-site stores or medical centres that the more they work, the further behind they get. It isn’t unusual for wages to be weeks or months in arrears -- if workers quit or are fired for complaining about the working conditions, they are cut off and never see the money they are owed. And those who advocate for action are the subjects of intimidation, harassment, and violence; union activists have even been murdered or “disappeared”.

Unions have a strong and solid history of negotiating better working conditions and protecting workers from abuses. Where you have the option to purchase union-made goods, go for it! The union movement in the Pacific is strong, and getting stronger. Many unions in the Pacific have educational and financial partnerships with unions in other places; if you are a unionized worker, find out if your union has such a partnership. Learn more about unions in the Pacific by visiting the Fiji Public Service Association website.

Support Fair Trade

Another way to help workers is to let retailers know that you want to be able to buy clothes, toys, shoes, and other consumer goods that have been made under equitable conditions – conditions that usually imply that they are worker-controlled and owned enterprises. Look for the words "Fair Trade" or "Fairly Traded" on products you buy. Coffee, flowers, tea, paper, soccer balls, baskets, mirrors – there are an increasing number of products bearing the Fair Trademark label. To find out more about Fair Trade, visit TransFair at www.transfair.com or OXFAM’s Make Trade Fair campaign at www.maketradefair.com. There are several international trade groups that work with local artisans and producers to import goods at a fair price to places like North America, Australia, and Europe. These artisans control the production of their goods, and determine what price they will get for their work. Here's a list of groups to get you started.

* Ten Thousand Villages at www.tenthousandvillages.com,
* Marketplace India at www.marketplaceindia.org,
* The Body Shop's community trade program at www.thebodyshop.com/web/tbsgl/values_sct_what.jsp

If you can't find fairly traded goods, look at the labels on the things you buy, and see if they were made in the Pacific. Then write to the company and ask them if they have a code of conduct for suppliers and what international monitoring agencies like the Maquila Solidarity Network have recorded on whether or not the codes are being followed (many companies have extensive codes of conduct that third-party observers have shown are ignored by the company). If you find something that says a company isn’t following its code of conduct, write a letter urging it to live up to its stated commitments; include a copy of the code if you can, and a copy or link to the report that illustrates how this code is being ignored. This kind of issue is a great candidate for starting a letter writing campaign; learn how here.

To learn more about sweatshops, globalization and fair trade, check out The Essential Guide to Global Citizenship at www.videa.ca/global or look into the Global Citizens for a Global Era book series from the Victoria International Development Education Association at www.videa.ca.

Invest Responsibly

Large corporations like international mineral companies are answerable to their shareholders; if you invest, or think you might at some point, you can specify to your financial institution that you don’t want your money to be assisting in the exploitation of people and ecosystems in the Pacific. If you choose to do this, make sure to write a letter to the companies you’re not investing in and let them know why you won’t be giving them your business. Learn how to take charge of your investing here.

Another way to help is to pressure your government to make companies based in your home country accountable for their foreign holdings. Write a letter to your minister responsible for foreign affairs or international trade letting them know that you expect your government to hold corporations accountable; check out our section on letter writing for some tips to get started. You can also join organized campaigns pressuring governments and corporations to make sure that resource extraction in the Pacific is done in a responsible way. Check out MiningWatch Canada for a great list of international campaigns pressing for responsible mining practices and what you can do to help.