UK backs ethical shopping over charity

Choosing to shop ethically is a better way to end poverty than occasionally donating to charity -- so says the UK public in a new survey carried out by the Department for International Development (DFID).

The survey shows that 74 per cent of adults in Great Britain think that they can help to reduce poverty by shopping carefully, much higher than the 65 per cent who think that it can be done with an occasional charitable donation.

"The rise of 'positive purchasing' among UK consumers is exciting. Many people give regular donations to aid and development charities -- which is marvellous -- but research shows more and more people are looking for additional ways they can make a difference," says Douglas Alexander, Secretary of State for International Development. "Buying products from developing countries fits the bill perfectly trade is very much the way forward for places like Africa."

Respondents also said that it's not easy to shop ethically (they obviously don't read SmartPlanet), with over half saying that they wouldn't ask a shop assistant where a product was sourced from because they thought they wouldn't know. To help this group, the DFID have put a helpful presentation on their website that runs through the basics of how to tell the ethical from the not-so-ethical.

Some chains are taking the matter firmly in hand, though -- the Cooperative Group, for example, was among one of the first outlets to stock Fairtrade products. "It's great to see that in the fifteen years since we began stocking the UK's first fair-trade products, the idea of ethical purchasing is now firmly established in the minds of shoppers," says Peter Marks, chief executive of The Co-operative Group.

Photo: The Fairtrade Foundation

Related Links

• SmartPlanet