May 3, 2005
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Contact: Melissa Schilling
(805) 783-2263
Club Urges Central Coast to Eat Chocolate
to Support Global Fair Trade May 8-14
SAN LUIS OBISPO - The Cal Poly Fair Trade Club is sponsoring Global Fair Trade Week on campus and in downtown San Luis Obispo May 8-14.
The club will have booths on campus and at San Luis Obispo's Farmers' Market to sell Fair Trade-certified chocolate and coffee and "Support Fair Trade" T-shirts designed by student artists. Students and faculty hope the week will publicize the issue of supporting third-world small farmers and co-ops with reasonable, 'fair trade' pricing for their goods.
The Cal Poly club is also partnering with local FFA students, who have already toured the campus chocolate lab and will be participating in some of the Global Fair Trade Week events.
May 18-14 is Global Fair Trade Week around the world, promoted by the non-profit group Oxfam (http://www.oxfam.org/), with 81 different countries participating.
Cal Poly's Fair Trade Club advisor, Food Science Professor Tom Neuhaus, has worked with cooperative chocolate farm groups in Ghana and Cameroon. Neuhaus is also the advisor to the Cal Poly Chocolates enterprise project, has more than doubled production in 2005, and is currently selling $40,000 worth of university chocolates annually.
In March, Cal Poly Chocolates received Fair Trade certification. The certification means Cal Poly Chocolates are made only from cocoa beans grown on certified farms and co-ops in tropical countries in Central and South America, the Caribbean, and West Africa.
For more details please contact Melissa Schilling, club president,
at:
mschilli@calpoly.edu.
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