Mission, Vision, and Values at TransFair USA

Our Approach to Building a Better World

Mission Statement

TransFair USA enables sustainable development and community empowerment by cultivating a more equitable global trade model that benefits farmers, workers, consumers, industry and the earth. We achieve our mission by certifying and promoting Fair Trade products.

Vision Statement

We seek to empower and enrich the lives of family farmers and workers around the world. Ours is a market-based approach to ending poverty, an alternative to dependency on aid. We believe farmers should get a fair price for their harvest, and workers deserve safe working conditions, a decent living wage and the right to organize. Through direct, equitable trade, farming and working families are able to eat better, keep their kids in school, improve health and housing, and invest in the future. Strong families, vibrant local economies, support for the natural environment, sustainable community development, and hope for the future - these are the results we seek through Fair Trade.

We envision millions of American consumers, increasingly concerned about the state of the world, looking for opportunities to use their power in the marketplace to make a positive difference. Through their shopping decisions, people have the ability to vote with their dollars for a better world. We seek to educate, inspire and mobilize this force for change. We believe the rise of the Conscious Consumer is causing a fundamental shift in the way companies do business, creating an historic opportunity to reward companies that embrace sustainability. For us, Fair Trade is not just a market; it is also a social movement that brings strength, hope and real choice to the world's consumers.

Companies should not have to choose between social responsibility and the bottom line. We envision Fair Trade as a new global business model that helps industry secure its own profitability and competitiveness while protecting the environment and ensuring a fair return to farmers and workers. We help industry forge long-term partnerships that strengthen global supply chains, obtain stellar product quality and support the development of disadvantaged producer communities. In our effort to reach consumers throughout the nation, we choose to collaborate with companies of all types and sizes, from mission-driven organizations and family-owned businesses to transnational corporations. By raising the bar and helping create new best practices in global trade and production, we aspire to remain the Gold Standard label for social and environmental sustainability.

Protecting the environment goes hand-in-hand with protecting the livelihoods of local communities. The Fair Trade model forges a direct link between social and environmental sustainability. We require rigorous protection of local ecosystems and ensure that farmers receive a harvest price that allows them to practice sustainable agriculture. We encourage farmers to transition to organic agriculture because it is safer for farm workers, healthier for consumers and better for the environment. Ultimately, we help farming families become the best stewards of the land and defenders of the planet's future.

We envision a day when Fair Trade products are readily available in mainstream stores across the country, when US consumers can opt for a "Fair Trade Lifestyle" and shop responsibly in every product category. This vision requires an inclusive approach to new products and stakeholders. Eventually, we seek to extend the Fair Trade model to industrial as well as agricultural products, and to goods produced in the global North as well. In the end, we aim to channel more of the opportunities and benefits of globalization to all the underprivileged farming and working families who today are being left behind. Fair Trade helps make "free trade" work for the poor.

Our Values

TransFair is its people and the values by which we live.

• Empowerment: We believe in empowerment and freedom of choice as means to a better world.

• Integrity: We strive to do the right thing and value relationships built on honesty, mutual respect and trust.

• Sustainability: We engage in sustainable solutions to global problems that affect the earth and its people.

• Innovation: We transform the world through entrepreneurial creativity and leading by example.

• Excellence: We believe that quality of life, work and performance is critical to achieving our mission.

• Personal Development: Strong organizations rely on strong individuals. We encourage and support each other in realizing our fullest potential, thereby strengthening our internal community.

• Community: We value our global and internal communities' diversity of perspectives, each holding a piece of the solution. We collaborate and partner for mutual success.

• Fairness: We work to create opportunities and extend the benefits of globalization to all people, everywhere.

• Impact: We build positive solutions that achieve meaningful social and environmental change in the world.