Fair traded preserves and chutneys

from Eswantini Swazy kitchen

These products contain no additives, preservatives or artificial colourings.

Produced and bottled in Swaziland.

Sauces -      Curry Hot,        Curry medium,          Chilli

Chutney-     Mixed fruit,      Hot mango

Pickles-        Lime

Marmalade-   Pure grapefruit, Lime, Kumquat, Pure orange,         

                         Orange and Grapefruit

Jam-            Guava,    Pineapple,    Marula,   Peach,

                     Ginger and mango,    Strawberry

ESWANTINA means made in Swaziland, it provides employment for women and generates income for the mansion youth care program in Swaziland, a tiny mountain kingdom between South Africa and Mozambique.

    Consumers make a direct connection with a network of several hundred Swazi men and women. Proceeds of the sales benefit 20 women who work full time in the kitchen, the Swazi farmers grow the fruit and a further 200 benefit from the process. 200 street children and HIV/Aids orphans receive housing, food and education.

    The project was set up by a catholic priest and an Anglican nun to create jobs and income. It is staffed entirely by local women from disadvantaged areas and buys all its fruit from local rural farmers. The project also supports a further six children’s homes.

     For the women who work there it has been a lifeline, from drug rehabilitation centres or living on the streets. Many had children who were starving and they felt worthless. One recent visitor said ‘It’s hard to believe that in just a few years they have a new outlook’

Mildred is the manager, appointed 13 years ago and has run the factory ever since. The management team are all women and one male delivery driver!!! In addition to the small local farmers the women bring produce from their small holdings and gardens. Sugar comes from Swazi sugar company which processes sugar from many small farmers. Fair trade Holland is currently applying for the Fair Trade mark for the sugar. The factory is carefully monitored and has received much help from the Dutch getting to grips with the EU regulations. 

    Swaziland is a country with the great extremes of wealth and poverty, 70% live on under a dollar a day, one of the highest rates of HIV/Aids infection in the world and some 80,000 orphans in a population of one million. Swaziland is a polygamous society where women have a little independence and say in their affairs. ESWATINI is working hard top empower economically, so they have a greater control over their lives.

    A word about Fair Trade and Eswatini

Eswatini clearly meets the criteria of Fair Trade. It pays fair wages and prices to its suppliers and aids the community.

Despite all this the Fair Trade mark cannot appear on the product, the reason is complicated. If the products were manufactured in the UK the products would bear the mark. Being mad overseas they need to be certified by FLO-Cert in Bonn, who require that all the ingredients should be fairly traded. This is hardly an option with the number of suppliers (think what would be involved with mixed fruit chutney!).

So, despite the fact that the value added to the fruit and sugar is being added in Swaziland and that the ingredients are supplied for the large part by small scale farmers in one of the poorest countries in Africa, there is no immediate prospect of getting the Fair Trade mark on the product. The story on the jars does indicate that this is fairly traded