The Fair Trade Advocacy Office (FTAO) has recently launched its new report “From local to EU level: Scaling Up Fair Trade in Europe”. The report aims at providing European Union policy makers with recommendations on how they can further help Local Authorities (LAs) to achieve sustainable development through local Fair Trade initiatives.

The research identified the current challenges that LAs face to promote Fair Trade at a local level, such as a lack of networking or funding opportunities and of Fair Trade supplies. However, the report also presents successful solutions to cope with these obstacles from national to local level.

These promising practices, together with EU policy recommendations, have been divided in four main areas: Public Procurement, Development Cooperation, Trade and Fair Trade specific initiatives. Seven countries and nine cities were involved in the research and as a result proved that there is a rich variety of alternatives to become social innovators through Fair Trade.

The full report can be read here.