Via Boing Boing: This is a shocking video where Eve Ensler explains that Congolese militias use rape to enforce discipline among a slave workforce that mines columbite-tantalite ore, a common raw material for many devices.
Ensler is campaigning for “Rape-Free” consumer electronics products whose raw, mineral components can be traced back to sources that can be verified to have procured them ethically.
The article “The Fair Tracing project: mapping a traceable value chain for Indian coffee”, by Ashima Chopra and Apurba Kundu has just been published in Contemporary South Asia, 17:2, June 2009, pp 213-223.
Abstract: This research note describes the second stage of the ‘Fair Tracing’, a research project funded by the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council of the United Kingdom. The project aims to support ethical trade by implementing digital tracing technologies in value chains to provide consumers and producers with enhanced information about specific products; in this case, Chilean wine and Indian coffee. The genesis and first stage of the project—as it related to the India case study—was documented in an earlier research note published in Contemporary South Asia one year ago. This note goes on to describe the second stage of this case study which beings by mapping the life of the coffee bean in its current global commodity chain, and ends with proposing a traceable value chain for small growers of Indian coffee. It is argued that the use of tracking technologies will help increase the value chain ‘rents’ that accrue to farmers in developing countries by allowing them to charge more for differentiated products increasingly demanded by informed consumers, both in the West and in home markets.
This article is the second in a projected series of three following the India case study of the Fair Tracing project. The first in the series was “The Fair Tracing project: digital tracing technology and Indian coffee”, Contemporary South Asia, 16:2, June 2008, pp 217-230.
Fair Tracing’s Research Fellow and Project Manager Dr Dorothea Kleine represented the project at ICTD2009, the international IEEE/ACM conference on Information and Communication Technologies and Development held in Doha, Qatar from 17-19 April 2009, with over 300 delegates in attendance.
Our demonstration, “Understanding the Provenance of Ethically Produced Goods”, showed the early Fair Tracing computer screen version with the Google Earth map, and used the Upcode application to demonstrate the tool on a mobile screen. We were able to let people use the Nokia N70 or N95 to scan a barcode on a bottle (in Qatar alcohol is banned so we had to go for a water instead of a wine bottle) or a coffee package. The mobile could then go online and link directly to key information from our Fair Tracing data set. Information on offer included the pie chart of “Where does the money go?”, the producer’s website, and the YouTube videos which we have produced in partnership with the Chilean producers.
There was great interest the Fair Tracing demo stand which was up for two days. Over 70 people came to talk to us and try out the demo, including development practitioners from Ecuador, Pakistan, Australia and Egypt.
Fair Trade consultant designer Helen Le Voi drew this new initiative to my attention, pointing out how good it would be for showing ethical sales: What towns are most ethical… what ethical goods are being bought in India from which region, etc. …
Zappos Launches Realtime Ordering Map
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