As a consumer you can purchase goods with a fair trade certified logo to help contribute to empowering individuals to achieve a self sustainable future for themselves and their families.

What is a fair trade town?

A fair trade town is a municipality that supports fair trade and makes the availability of fair trade products wide spread within the town. There are six requirements to becoming a fair trade town:

1. The local council must use fair trade certified products and supports the fair trade town campaign.
2. Stores and restaurants serve fair trade certified products
3. Workplaces, faith groups and schools use and promote fair trade certified products
4. Public awareness events and media coverage of the campaign
5. A steering committee must be formed to continue fair trade growth and committment
6. Other ethical and sustainable initiatives are promoted within the town

Congratulations to our friends in Vancouver for this wonderful objective of helping to eliminate poverty around the world.

To find out more about Fair Trade Vancouver visit their site.

Uganda Jewelry - Recycled Paper Jewelry and more

The jewelry also includes bone fashion bangles and weaved palm tree coin purses in bright and fun colours.

Take a look at all the Uganda Jewelry on the website.

The Bali jewelry is always very popular among our customers as it as a beautiful and unique Balinese pattern to the pieces. You call always pick out a Balinese designed piece of jewelry just by looking at the patterns in the design.

Beautiful New Bali Artisan Jewellery

With this new collection there are new artisan rings, one which features abalone shell mixed with sterling silver Balinese pattern alternated in a checkered fashion on the face of a square adjustable ring. The second ring is a large artisan cocktail ring with a round face featuring a carved Balinese traditional floral design pattern. This ring is stunning.

We’ve also received in a number of new harmony ball pendants, our most popular item at Pangea Collection. Check out the new selection.

Of course earrings and other pendants are among our customer favs as well. This new collection includes a large shell and sterling silver drop shape pendant in red and white shell mix; a silver filigree butterfly or dragonfly pendant with amethyst accent stone along with coordinating earrings with a variety of accent stones. Large filigree loop earrings and more.

Check out all the artisan jewellery at Pangea Collection.

New Chile Fair Trade Jewelry

As you will well know, Chile recently suffered a terrible earthquake. As the people of Chile focus on rebuilding, jewellery artisans need to find export markets to sell their jewellery in order to earn a living and support their families.

Not only are these jewellery pieces helping a worthy cause but they are also beautiful and fashionable.

Jewellery materials include glass jewelry, copper jewelry, ceramic jewelry, macrame and crochet jewelry. The jewelry includes cocktail rings, earrings, bracelets, cuff bangles and necklaces.

The jewelry features some of the traditional materials used in Chile such as Lapis and copper. One of the artisans creates stunning copper cuff bracelets with bronze and various stone accents. He creates a similar style of copper and bronze rings.

Glass is also a common material used by Chilean jewelry artisans. The new fair trade jewelry includes glass necklaces, glass cocktail rings and earrings.

A new material for Pangea Collection are the macramé and crochet earrings. These are available in bright colours and are even available in a butterfly design.

There are also new artisan cocktail rings made with ceramic and glass. They feature adjustable wide bands and a funky round or rectangular ring face. Perfect for making a statement.

Check out the all of the Chile fair trade jewelry on the website.

Prices start at just $19.99 and include free shipping.

Together we can do our small part to enable artisans in Chile and all over the world.

The sale is at Liberty Village fro 10 to 7 each day. Hope to see you there!

FGI Spring Sample Sale - Clothing, Accessory and Jewelry Sale

Long Dangling Hammered Circle Earrings

Silver Cuff Bracelet - Wire Bead Bracelet

Stunning Silver Filigree Heart Pendant

The new handmade silver jewelry from Mexico includes cocktail artisan rings, silver cuff bracelets, 925 sterling silver link bracelets (heart bracelet, square link bracelets), solid silver necklaces, handmade silver earrings and more. Check out the whole collection of Mexican Silver Jewelry.

Classic Silver Hoop Earrings

The Crave Guide is a shopping guide for a specific geographic area that lets shoppers know about women owned businesses in their area. Each page of the Crave Guide profiles a women owned business.

Be sure to get your Crave Guide as many of the businesses offer special discounts and bonuses for Crave Guide readers. I will have the guides available for sale in mid May on the Pangea Collection website for $20/each.

The photographer, Richelle from Conception Design, who took Pangea Collection photos for the guide wrote a lovely article to give you a bit of a sneak peak on some of those women owned businesses that will be profiled in the book.

Check out Richelle’s blog, business and other GTA businesses featured here at Conception Design.

Round Red, Purple, Blue and Green Mosaic Mexican Earrings

The fair trade mosaic jewelry has been handcrafted in Mexico by a women’s art cooperative. Their town has a long history of jewelry making and they learned their trade from their parents and grandparents.

Mosaic Heart Bracelet

This fair trade mosaic jewelry technique is precise and labour intensive. Each piece of jewelry is handcrafted with attention to detail and love. The mosaic jewelry includes, mosaic bracelets (in heart shapes and marquise), an adjustable heart ring and a wide variety of mosaic earrings from delicate to larger. Check out the entire new fair trade Mexican Mosaic Jewelry.

Pink and Yellow Drop Mosaic Earrings

My husband and I had the pleasure of visiting Chile last Christmas and meeting many of the fair trade jewelry artisans featured at Pangea Collection. We visited the office of the fair trade organisation and met with the artisans who had come to showcase their beautiful jewelry. It is for this reason the impact of the earthquake has an even more personal feeling for me.

When I woke up on Saturday morning I immediately emailed my contact at the fair trade organisation to check to see if all was okay with the staff of the organisation as well as the artisans who are located in many areas of Chile, not just Santiago. For several days as I’ve been watching the news I’ve been thinking of them and wondering if indeed they were okay.

Today I received an update indicated the delay was, not surprisingly, a result of electricity and internet outages. The good news is that everyone at the fair trade organisation and their families are okay. The bad news is that they have been unable to reach many of the artisans to find out how they are.

Below is part of the message which the Chilean fair trade organisation is sharing with their partners and friends around the world.

SUPPORT FOR FAMILIES OF ARTISANS AND PRODUCERS AFFECTED BY THE EARTHQUAKE IN CHILE

With great dismay, we are now handling the significant impact of this tremendous earthquake in the regions of Maule, Biobío, and facing a smaller scale of damage, the Metropolitan Region.

We would like to forward our support, companionship, solidarity and love, especially to the families of our artisans and farmers that work in these areas. As a team, we are sending all of our support in offering the network of contacts we manage from Santiago throughout the world. In particular, we sending support to Lipimávida Fruits, production plant of canned papaya, in Ilocos, VII Region, which was completely devastated by the tsunami. We still have no news from this region.

As major communication lines remain cut, we will continue to try contacting these artisans and producers. We are also taking up contact with people in the rural areas surrounding Santiago that were also strongly impacted. We are making an effort to contact these producers to better understand their conditions and how we can help. We send our all of our support.

We greatly appreciate the solidarity and concern of our friends in the various countries that work with us in Fair Trade. We have already received messages from many of our clients who have been our friends and partners for many years. Thank you very much for your concern. We will be advising everyone whether there is any specific help that we need that can be channeled through to these devastated areas.

Our thoughts and prayers are with everyone that has suffered from this disastrous event. We ask that God helps everyone contribute in building solidarity with those affected.

The Mahashivratri festival is one of the few Hindu festivals which is celebrated during both the day and night. Most Hindu festivals are celebrated during the day. The festival is celebrated just prior to the new moon. While each new moon is dedicated to Shiva, Mahashivratri is especially important as it is the night when he danced the cosmic dance, Tandav.

In Hinduism, the night represents evil, injustice, ignorance, sin, violence and misfortune. Shiva is said to have appeared during the new moon to save the world from darkness and ignorance.

Celebrations include an observance of fasting and staying up all night at temples. Fasting is practiced through the night and is only broke the following morning. During the festival, Shiva is offered special food items made of seasonal fruit, vegetables and coconut. These offerings are called prasad and are then consumed in the morning after the new moon.

Young girls fast in hopes that Siva will bless them with a good husband. They sing songs in praise of Shiva and chant throughout the night.

Pujas (prayers) are performed four times during the night. The phallic symbol of Shiva is worshipped in temples by performing a bathing ritual of milk, water, honey, sandalwood paste. Following the bathing ritual, the symbol is adorned with flowers and garland.