I received a wonderful gift basket this morning from a publisher, as a Valentine’s Day gift. It was from Global Exchange, which is an organization to promote sustainability and fair trade goods. It’s also a sibling organization to CodePINK – both are headed up by Medea Benjamin. CodePINK has worked with Global Exchange on projects, including a booth at the Exchange Expo in DC the weekend I was there to protest in September.
So it was not only appropriate that the basket contained a half-pound of chocolate covered espresso beans, but also that it came from an organization that I believe in, whose founder I’ll probably see at the CODEPINK meeting on Saturday. And I bet she’ll love hearing that this publisher is sending out fair trade chocolate as gifts, instead of the unsustainable, white-flour-and-sugar, stale cracker and cheese spread baskets that we usually get as thank-yous. The chocolate in this basket is much tastier, higher quality, and wasn’t made with over-use of harmful, illegal in the States pesticides, or child labor, or any one of a number of evils. It’s a small difference that takes one more step towards saving the world – and I’m glad that this publisher spent some of the money I invested in the campaign with them, to invest in the rest of the planet.
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