Chocolate trumps at Fairtrade Awards

Bennetto Natural Foods purchases cocoa direct from a certified Fairtrade supplier in Peru. Photo / Supplied

Chocolate was the big winner at this year's Fairtrade Awards - showing that sweet-toothed New Zealanders are an increasingly ethical bunch too.

Over the last two weeks New Zealanders have been voting online for their favourite of 27 Fairtrade certified products, picked from the more than 2000 now available on the shelves here and in Australia.

Two out of three categories were won by chocolate products. Whittaker's 5 roll refined milk chocolate won the big business category, as it has every year since the awards began in 2012. The small business category was taken out by newcomer Bennetto Natural Foods with its meltable drinking-chocolate bar.

Auckland-based company All Good Organics, which has imported Fairtrade bananas since 2010 and now sells 60,000 bunches a week, won the medium business category.

Founder of Bennetto Natural Foods Lucy Bennetto told Element she was "completely taken by surprise" to have won, particularly because she has only been trading since May.

She said it was important her products had integrity and that consumers knew exactly what they were eating and where it was coming from.

"If you can't at least have some sort of awareness or some sort of accountability for what you are doing then there is no point in doing it."

Bennetto said she was proud to be associated with Fairtrade as it is "a system that focuses on supporting producers". The Christchurch-based company purchases cocoa mass and butter directly from a certified Fairtrade supplier in Peru.

The Fairtrade mark is registered to Fairtrade International and signals that suppliers are working under fair conditions and being paid a fair wage. Fairtrade Australia and New Zealand certifies local products which meet the international standards.

In the last year, New Zealand sold more than $63 million of Fairtrade certified goods - up $10 million from the year before. And according to a recent Colmar Brunton survey, 79 per cent of New Zealanders recognise the Fairtrade mark and know what it stands for.

The CEO of Fairtrade Australia and New Zealand, Molly Olson, said she hoped the growing number of New Zealanders supporting companies which had "ethical leadership" would "inspire more businesses to look at their own supply chains".

What is Fairtrade?

• Fairtrade certified products signal that producers receive enough money to cover the cost of production.

• A Fairtrade mark also mean that producers receive a "Fairtrade premium". This means money goes into a fund for workers to use "to improve their social, economic and environmental conditions".

• More than 1.4 million farmers and workers across 74 developing countries benefit from the Fairtrade system. In 2013, close to US$110 million was paid out in Fairtrade premiums.

Source: Fairtrade International.