nutiva partners with fair trade usa to support coconut farming communities

In 2014, we began partnering with our organic coconut farmers to source fair trade coconut products. We’re excited that our 14oz (glass) and 23oz (glass) Virgin Coconut Oil and our O’Coconut snacks are now Fair Trade certified.
For our coconut farmers in the Philippines, Fair Trade means that for every coconut they sell on fair trade terms, they receive an extra premium deposited into their community fund. These farmers come together to identify their greatest challenges and decide how they’ll invest in projects that improve their farms and strengthen their communities.

We’d like to thank you, our customers, because your support of Nutiva fair trade certified products in 2014 helped our farmers in the Philippines implement the following impactful projects:

• School lunch program – to ensure nutritious meals for children in the community
• Scholarships – to subsidize tuition fees and higher education costs for children of farmers
• Community rice buying program – to improve access to quality food staples
• Micro-loans – to provide funds with nominal interest for farmers to start their own businesses
• Coconut tree replanting – to ensure productive farms and sustainable livelihoods for years to come
• Disaster fund – to help farmers to recover more quickly from unexpected disasters, like typhoons
• Decorticating machine – to enable farmers to earn additional income from coconut husks

The school lunch program has been particularly impactful in the community of Catanuan where many of the children are under-nourished. Through a local needs assessment farmers decided to invest in education by providing children with the nutrition they need to be healthy, happy, and productive in the classroom. The program—which was truly an effort of the entire community—was implemented in 8 schools and includes 240 students, from preschool to third grade.

Fair Trade premiums were used to purchase food supplies to provide students with nutritious meals over 120 school days. The teachers coordinate meal planning, budgeting, monitoring of student’s weight, attendance, and academic performance to measure progress. The program also involves the students’ parents as volunteers to help with shopping, cooking, and food serving.

At Nutiva, we aspire to “Nurture Vitality” and that includes the health and well-being of the farming communities that supply us with our superfoods. We’re excited to have found a way to provide outstanding superfoods to our customers while supporting our growers at the same time.