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Our Big Fair Trade
Adventure (2008)
Martha, Robin and Diko are pupils at Cheney Secondary School in Oxford. Environmental and ethical issues form an important part of their curriculum, the school even has a fair trade club.
These teenagers are angry at what they see as the greed of the high street clothes shops, where the workers seldom benefit financially from the clothes they make. So, they are embarking on a mission of a lifetime to India. Their aim is to redress this balance - by sourcing for themselves the materials needed to make their own ethical school shirt to sell back at home.
During the course of their roadtrip through the
cotton fields and factories, they experience at first hand the darker
side of the garment industry. From the child workers as young as nine
who spend days bent double picking cotton for pennies - to the harmful
effects of pesticides on the farmers. It also hits home how different
their lives would be had they been born over there.
But they do discover that change is possible -
that famers and workers do not have to be exploited. In the end they
have the choice of two ethical organisations who are prepared to
produce their garment...but will they be able to convince their
classmates to buy one?
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