Fairtrade Award ideas for the two Portsmouth Dioceses



	A fairly brief briefing on Hugh Gibbons	www.just1.org.uk/ hughgibbons@just1.org.uk

Fairtrade charity begins at home. Certified Fairtrade through CAFOD in 2005, the Just1 global HQ - well, the Gibbons household - has been all for Fairtrade coffee and tea, sugar, bananas, chocolate, flowers, wine, and clothing. CONTACT hughgibbons@just1.org.uk	Revive '25 is a late entry in my history of action for Fairtrade - and other widespread social and climate justice campaigning. I've long been an enthuser as well as user. As a CAFOD Schools and Media Volunteer, in 2005 I was invited to join the small working party that Bishop Crispian Hollis set up to drive the adoption of Fairtrade by a majority of the then 120+ parishes in the diocese. I wrote and designed the briefing and press releases sent out to all of them. In very short time 55% signed up, and January 2006 Portsmouth was proclaimed a Fairtrade Diocese. NB Suggest, suggested +Crispian. At a big meeting at Farnborough Hill, unusually he aired a grievance probably shared by all bishops. "People are always writing to me to say what I should do." So since that moment I've always tried to offer everyone thoughts couched as suggestions - and never use Should. Later on I got to encourage Fairtrade in schools and parishes. So there's a very DIY but info-packed website from about 2012 for schools - www.just1.org.uk/fairtrade. It's quite fun to browse - especially to see what schools can do on social justice matters (IMHO knocking spots off most parishes). NB That includes a list of Fairtrade Denominational Groups certified by the Fairtrade Foundation as it stood in 2012. To help parishes celebrate the 30th anniversary of Fairtrade in September 2024, I created a website and suggestions at www.just1.org.uk/fairtrade2024 . '25 is an obvious spin-off from this. And as an independent organisation of one, Just1 first got me involved in the advocacy work of BOND. This led me to create what's currently Stand Up/Sing Out Against Poverty in which by email I managed to get tens of thousands of pupils and staff to do just that. You can see more at www.just1.org.uk/schools.	Leading St Joseph's Catholic Primary in Hurst Green singing a message to their MP Leading St Mary's CoF Primary in Bracknell in The Life of a Banana Fairtrade sign made to go on the railings outside St Joseph's Church in the centre of Bracknell on view to thousands of passers-by each day for a year.

	Getting the word out to wider publics

That's me with Mrs Rashni, head teacher of the school in Banda Aceh which had lost 60 pupils to the 2004 tsunami. CAFOD sent me to see and report on projects funded by parishioners and the Disasters Emergency Committee. So my story hit the Catholic nationals, local BBC and other radio stations, and about 5000 people in person in schools, parishes and groups.	Bracknell News 2005 CAFOD gave me great media skills training to add to my previous business experience in managing creative services and marketing research. Above all: get the story out - in person, on paper, page, website, screen, radio, TV - to as many people as possible. The lessons have been applied in dozens of press releases, flyers to dioceses, letters of persuasion, and 100+ talks on all sorts of topics to schools, charities, clubs, church groups et al. So Fairtrade featured in four of the dozen and a half Thought for the Week articles I contributed to the weekly Bracknell, Ascot, Wokingham, Crowthorne and Sandhurst News. Each time the editor wanted 250 words, please. So it was quite a challenge for others on the rota of local church voices used to sermons. They still seem to make good sense. So they're all below. If you want a larger version, just click on the Thought.	Over 40 radio stations and the leading press in Minnesota carried my broadcast about what I uncovered at what become Thanksgiving Field near Windsor - simply sent the story shaped for them.
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