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2016
Wake up to the big fairtrade breakfast!
29 February – 13 March
The Fairtrade Mark
is 21 years old. We've
made great progress
and enjoyed some proud
achievements. We’ve
learnt a few things
along the way too. We
may feel like we’re all
grown up but we still
have a long way to go and
a lot more to achieve!
Banana farmers Dalcio Castillo (left) and Misalia Martinez, Coobafrio co-operative, Colombia
In Fairtrade Fortnight 2016, we will continue to grow. Join us
in shining a light on the scandal that despite working hard to
grow the food we eat every day, many farmers and workers in
developing countries don’t earn enough to know where their
families’ next meal is coming from.
Fairtrade works to change this, and where producers are able
to sell enough of their produce on Fairtrade terms, it can make
a life-changing difference. Fairtrade now reaches over 1.5
million farmers and workers across the globe. However, with
around 795 million people undernourished globally, and many
in farming communities, we still have so far to go.
You, and your church, have the power to change this. Please
join others throughout the UK by taking part in the Big
Fairtrade Breakfast, before or after your services. This guide
offers some ideas for worship and all-age activities to use to
mark Fairtrade Fortnight in your church. You can find more
ideas and activities online at fairtrade.org.uk/fortnight
Put your church on
the Big Fairtrade
Breakfast map!
Share Fairtrade breakfast
items before or after
church, take a picture and
let us know. We’ll add
your breakfast to
thousands of others
on a special online
map to show just how
much the UK cares about
the people who grow
our food and drink.
You will know what works best for you and your own church
situation, so of course feel free to adapt these ideas to suit
your needs. If you have another great idea for mobilising your
church for Fairtrade Fortnight, we’d love to hear about it.
Please email [email protected] with details.
Sit down for breakfast stand up for farmers
prayers
Creator God,
You created a beautiful world for all your children.
As we taste and smell the fruits of this creation
help us to remember those who farm the land to
grow them. Help us live in a partnership of love and
support with those who produce our food and drink
so that we might enable others to feed their families
and create a sustainable future.
Amen.
Loving God, you make us in your image.
Forgive us when we fail to see your image
in each other, when we give in to greed and
indifference
when we do not question the systems
that are life-denying.
As we are made in your image,
let us live in your image
and be Christ-like
in service, endurance and love.
Amen.
A prayer for Fair Trade
As I enter the street market
Wheel my trolley at the superstore
Leaf through a catalogue, or log
on to the internet:
Be with me and help me
When I spend money
Be with me and help me
To see the market place as you see it
As wide as the world you love so much
Be with us and help us
To share the markets we share
For all people.
As we live under your steady gaze,
So we can change, by your gracious love.
Amen.
God of love and justice,
we give thanks for the gifts
planted in all of us.
We remember the power we
embody when we share these gifts:
the compassion and understanding,
the fire, and the vigour.
We honour your Word living within us,
inspiring people
to protest at greed,
to work for justice,
to passionately share their resources
and cherish all life.
Esther Bor, Kenya
For further resources, including:
• All-age talk for Fairtrade Fortnight
• Reflections on lectionary readings
• Information about Fairtrade and food security
• Merchandise and resources
• Further activity ideas
Visit fairtrade.org.uk/fortnight
Yours is the outspoken love,
Yours is the outrageous hope,
Yours is the extravagant mercy.
So to you be the honour and the
power and the glory,
Amen.
interactive
prayer
You will need:
Fairtrade coffee, Fairtrade rice, Fairtrade chocolate, a laptop
to show a video, a thought for each station written and ready.
Create prayer stations around the church for each sense:
touch, taste, smell, sight and hearing.
Touch
Bowl of Fairtrade rice.
Encourage people to
run their fingers through
it and, as they do, think
about the hard work that
has gone into getting it
to the table or bags.
Taste
Smell
Bowl of coffee.
Encourage people to smell
it and think about the bitterness
of injustice in our world, that many
coffee farmers in Latin America
don’t earn enough to guarantee
feeding their families all
year round.
Bowl of Fairtrade
chocolate or a banana.
People have a piece each and
think about the many people
who are hungry today due to
food insecurity. It’s estimated
around 795 million people are
undernourished globally.
using a tem-plate!
You will need:
Paper plates,
colouring pens,
pencils or crayons.
The most amazing
breakfast ever
Get children to draw their best
breakfast ever on a paper plate.
They write a prayer for the people
who have made their food on the
back. You can either display them
in your church or ask your local
supermarket to put them
up to show how much
people in your community
value Fairtrade products.
See AND HEAR
Choose a video from the
selection at www.youtube.com/
fairtradefoundation and show
it to communicate the difference
we can all make by choosing
Fairtrade. The 90-second
Fairtrade Matters clip or video
at fairtrade.org.uk/rahel
could work well.
Craft activities
1
You can build on this idea by including
other Fairtrade products and sharing
the stories of the people behind them.
2
Grace on a plate
Write a grace on the plate thanking
God for food and praying for
a world in which everyone has
enough to eat and feed their
families every day. Read them out
or display them.
3
A silly
breakfast *
Ask the children to draw pictures
on the plate of the silliest breakfast
they can dream up. It might be
chocolate and baked beans or
ketchup on cornflakes, egg and
banana wraps! Or write a silly new
recipe with unusual ingredients.
If they think this is silly then ask
them to think about how silly it is
that so many people go hungry
when there is enough food in the
world for everyone. Share with
them how Fairtrade works to try
to change this. Use the stories at
fairtrade.org.uk/fortnight
*Adapted from CAFOD education resources
FAIRTRADE FOOD FOR THOUGHT
ups)
(for discussion in small gro
Fairtrade
gives us the
security that we
will get at least
the minimum to
be able to have
a decent life in
the future…
Before you finish eating
breakfast in the morning, you've
depended on More than half of the
world... We aren’t going to have
peace on earth until we recognise
this basic fact of the interrelated
structure of all reality.
Martin Luther King Jr
Christian Dubon, coffee farmer, Honduras
Why do you think Martin Luther King says we won’t
have peace on earth until we recognise this? Think
about where your breakfast came from this morning.
Tea from India or Kenya, coffee from Ethiopia or
Honduras, bananas from Colombia or the Windward
Islands, sugar from Malawi or Fiji? What work by
farmers might have gone into producing these products?
Is it fair that those who produce our food don’t earn
enough to feed themselves or their families? What is the
Fairtrade Foundation doing to challenge this?
Food security cannot be taken for granted in many
parts of the world, including for many who grow the
things we consume every day, such as cocoa or coffee.
In some Latin American countries for example, many
coffee growing families still consider that they have
no guarantee of food security for up to four months a
year. It’s so common that the phenomenon has many
names: the thin months, the months of the big stomach,
seasons of hunger, times of silence or the months of
water. It means families subsist on a basic diet of maize
and beans, or parents skip meals and children can’t
concentrate at school because they’re hungry.
It is not God’s will for
some to have everything and
others to have nothing.
Have you ever felt really hungry? How did it feel?
What did it then feel like to have a meal? Imagine if
you didn’t know if you would have a meal today.
How different would your day be? What do Christian
and other Fairtrade farmers say about the difference
selling on Fairtrade terms makes to their lives? How
can you commit to buying more Fairtrade products
as a church or individual? How can your church work
to encourage shops to stock more Fairtrade products
that change lives?
Archbishop Oscar Romero
What did Archbishop Oscar Romero mean when he
said this? Some 795 million people are undernourished
and it is estimated that half the world's hungry live on
small farms, some of which grow crops to export. How
do you and your church challenge the injustices that
cause hunger and food insecurity?
Above is adapted from CAFOD education resource
fairtrade.org.uk
Fairtrade Foundation, 3rd Floor,
Ibex House, 42-47 Minories,
London EC3N 1DY
Tel: +44 (0) 20 7405 5942 Email: [email protected]
Registered charity no. 1043886
A company limited by guarantee, registered in England and Wales no. 2733136
Photography credits: Trevor Appleson, Tessa Jol, Simon Rawles, Eduardo Martino
Acknowledgments
Thanks to Christian Aid Collective
for creating the church
resources. Check them out at
christianaidcollective.org