Thom Yorke
Strapline: MTF
"How sweet does your chocolate taste when you know the producer in
a country you will never see did not even get paid enough to feed his family?
How sweet does it taste when you see the amount of profit a few multinational
corporations make on it?
How sweet does it taste, exactly, to know our own governments prevent these
countries from ever getting off their knees & from ever being able to compete
and get PAID, erecting barriers and then DUMPING on them from a great height
whilst feigning concern?
How delicious it is to know that sweet taste in your mouth is one of slavery,
a nice new economic model?
As it melts in your mouth, how sweet does your chocolate taste, now you know
the suffering that it took to get to you?"
Haile Gebrselassie
"All around the world people are enjoying the finest coffee from Ethiopia
while our coffee farmers can hardly earn a descent living. International trade
can end poverty. But the rules have to be fair for everybody."
Chris Martin
Strapline: MTF or dumped
"When rice is dumped on you it hurts. When it's dumped on a nation it hurts everyone. Rice farmers in Haiti used to produce enough for the whole country - now they are bankrupt. It doesn't have to be this way"
“It's crazy that for every dollar given to poor countries in aid, two dollars are lost because of unfair trade. Anyone can see that it's just not right. Farmers should be able to get a fair price for their produce so they can afford a decent standard of living. That's why I joined the MakeTrade Fair campaign."
Michael Stipe
Strapline: MTF or dumped
“It leaves a very sour taste in the mouth to know that world trade rules allow the richest countries in the world to milk the poorest farmers in the world dry. Mali has 6 and a half million cattle yet 9,000 tonnes of powdered milk is being imported into the country every year. If we are serious about tackling poverty we change the global world trade rules and make trade fair.”
Angelique Kidjo
Strapline: MTF
"Unfair world trade rules are having a devastating impact on millions of people's lives. Trade restrictions in rich countries cost the developing countries around $100 billion a year- twice as much as they receive in aid. This simply can't go on."
Youssou N'dour
Strapline: MTF or dumped
“The US spends nearly $4 billion a year on subsidising corporate cotton producers. As a result, 10 million farmers in West Africa are being pushed deeper and deeper into poverty as they can’t sell their cotton. Just imagine what they could do with that $4 billion! Unfair trading in cotton – it’s just not on!”
Bobby Friction
Strapline: MTF or dumped
"The fact that 1.1 Billion people on this earth of ours live on less than $1 a day is a bad enough indictment on 'us' in the West. The fact that Global Trade rules mean a penniless farmer in the Developing world has to pay Tariffs FOUR times higher than a 'super-farmer' from the US or Europe is not only bad, but in my mind morally repugnant.
Who took the 'Free' out of the Free Market? We in the West did! Who has the power to put the 'Fair' in a Fair Market? We in the West do! Its something we all have to fight for, its something only we have the power to do, and I believe its immoral not to."
Nuttin' funny about it.
"It is a disappointment that the world's love for coffee does not extend to paying fair prices to the farmers that grow it. It would be good to see them benefiting as well as the big corporations. We are pleased to be doing something to help Oxfam's campaign to Make Trade Fair."
"I believe that one of the fundamentals for freedom is the recognition of the end product of labour, the only barrier being the respect for those who produce it and those who consume it".
"Creo que una de las bases fundamentales de la libertad es el reconocimiento del producto del trabajo, sin más barreras que el respeto, tanto para la dignidad del que lo produce, como de aquel que lo adquiere".
Colin Firth
Strapline: MTF
No quote available
Minnie Driver
Strapline: MTF
No quote available
Antonio Banderas
Strapline: MTF or dumped
No quote available
Alanis Morissette
Strapline: MTF or dumped
“I support Oxfam in shining the light on the importance of leveling the playing field to ensure that small farms, the farmers themselves, and their communities benefit from equal opportunity and subsidization. I support them in sharing what the benefits of leveling this playing field would be to world, and wish most pointedly for our government to consider changing their policies to protect all (and not just a select few) farmers.”
Text 1
“Mientras en Estados Unidos los barones del algodón reciben
$4,000 millones de dólares en subsidios al año, en Perú
los productores de algodón se hunden cada día más en la
miseria.”
“While the cotton barons of the United States receive four billion dollars of subsidies every year, the Peruvian cotton growers sink deeper into misery every day.”
Text 2
“Ay, baron, copper baron of the North. Chains of cotton, the same
slavery as before, except now the links are not made of steel but of a cotton
as unyielding as the empire which governs my life and my death. I give you fifty
years of my life, and you give me back one, just one: for me only, only in South
America, only in the cotton field.”
-----------------------
“Qué poco abriga el dolor de tener unas manos que cosechan
todo y reciben nada.
Baila, Barón del algodón, con mi pena, con mi frío, con mi hambre, que los golondrinos* siguen sin hacer el verano. Vuelo de campo en campo con la alforja y el pecho siempre vacíos. A tu campo no llegaré, allende el Norte dista de mi espalda tanto como tu indiferencia.
El algodón no sana heridas, no cubre mi piel, sólo colma mis ojos y empantana mis pulmones. Con el algodón has hecho mi mortaja, la visto desde niño como mi padre y mi madre, y mañana mis hijos, y los hijos de mis hijos, pero nunca los tuyos, Barón del algodón.
Ay, Barón, ay, Barón del algodón del Norte. Cadenas de algodón, la misma esclavitud sólo que ahora los eslabones no son de acero, son de algodón tan fuerte como el imperio que gobierna mi vida y mi muerte. Te entrego 50 años de mi vida y me devuelves uno, uno sólo, para mí solo, solo en Sudamérica, solo en el algodonal.”
By Giuliana Mazzetti
*Recogedores temporales de algodón
Didier Awadi
On the campaign:
“There needs to be more justice in North-South relations, especially
in trade relations. So that there can be more respect amongst people and more
justice in the way we trade, in the way we do business between north and south.
The current system is one of double standards, and at this rate people will
never be able to make it. In the end, this struggle may lead to rancor between
communities. It is these political and economic rules that hurt human relations.”
On his involvement:
“As artists we are very privileged. We are listened to because of
what we do. If we can continue to do what we do it is a blessing. The only way
for us to give back to the public what they have given us and what they continue
to give us is to become engaged on a just cause that can help people. For me
this is an obligation. We cannot live certain things, see people struggle as
a result of injustice to make a living and be blind. We don't have the right
to be blind. If we stay quiet it is like we are condoning what is happening
around us.”
Hippolyte Ouangrawa
On the campaign:
“Our countries need to be implicated in this fight so that we can
consume what we produce. We have to sensitize everyone: the farmers, the workers
and the intellectuals to accept what we produce. As long as we are unable to
trade our products we will never be able to develop. In addition we have to
begin consuming our own products. This is how we can strengthen our economy.”
On his involvement:
“Being well known here, people listen to me. Actors are especially
listened to here. What we say on TV or on the radio, our exposure has turned
us into legends. Some people hold what we say here as the truth. They hold us
to high standards and expect that we will not trick them into something that
is bad for them. We have to put all our know-how and talent is sensitizing populations
in consuming what is produced here (instead of what is just being dumped on
our markets).”
Damon Albarn
This is an outrageous scandal! Unable to sell their tomatoes, farmers in Ghana
are losing their livelihoods. Is this fair when European farmers are given subsidies
of £250 million annually by the EU to grow excessive amounts of tomatoes?