For many people, the phrase ethical consumerism sounds like a contradiction.
Ethical: trying to live well, do the right thing. On the other hand, consumerism: that state in which you succumb to a shoptastic frenzy, vacuuming up all manner of tat and piling up a mountain of debt as you go.
Surely the only really ethical choice is not to consume at all, unless you have to? Well, up to a point. The greenest stereo, sweater, bamboo coaster, is the one you don't buy in the first place, because the old one's good for another year.
It's certainly a tribute to the power of the environmental message that all kinds of more or (often) less scrupulous companies have jumped on the bandwagon. You see them flogging, for example, rainforest-free paper (tip: rainforest trees aren't used to make paper). A green and his money, it would seem, are easily parted …
So is ethical consumerism just a distinctly unethical con for the green and the gullible? Fortunately, there's more to it than that. We all have to eat, drink, wear clothes, heat homes and even occasionally get merry. We all, in other words, have to shop. Every time you hand over money, you're making a tiny, often unconscious, impact on someone's quality of life, way down the supply chain. Someone who's almost certainly a lot less well off than you.
So why not try to make your impact helpful rather than harmful?
That, in essence, is the heart of ethical consumerism. And it's easy to forget how much difference it can make. Take Fairtrade coffee. Prior to its increasingly mainstream profile, few people knew quite how vulnerable coffee farmers were to wildly fluctuating global prices over which they had absolutely no control. One year they might make a decent living; the next, they might get so little for their harvest that they couldn't afford to send their kids to school or buy essential medicines. It's hardly surprising that many Colombian farmers switched to growing coca instead.
By giving farmers a guaranteed price over a number of years, Fairtrade takes away that debilitating uncertainty. And it also allows them to invest in their crop, so the quality of the coffee improves, too. It was all nicely summed up by their early advertising slogans: "You get excellent coffee. Their kids get an education."
When it comes to giving someone a helping hand, trade wins out over charity in several ways. It treats people as equals, not victims. It shows respect. And because it's rooted in straightforward business logic – a decent price for a decent product – it's not so vulnerable to the fickle whims of charitable donors.
The other accusation that's levelled against the whole idea of ethical consumerism is that it's just a feelgood guilt-trip for the liberal rich. And a fairweather one at that – just look at them avoiding the supposedly higher-priced green goods when the recession bites, eh? Well, on that score, the figures are surprisingly reassuring. Sales of Fairtrade goods have held up surprisingly well in the past year, growing by around one-fifth in 2008, and still rising.
Yes, many ethical goods are more expensive than non-ethical equivalents. But you get what you pay for. A bar of gorgeously rich, organic, Fairtrade chocolate or a fat-laden, sugary substitute containing virtually no real cocoa is hardly a like-for-like comparison.
But cheap goods are often cheap not because they're better value, but because their purchase price doesn't include the true costs of their production: costs such as cleaning up the pollution from a dirty factory. If those costs were internalised – for example, by imposing a tax on pollution – then the price would have to rise to reflect that. But don't hold your breath. Governments have been talking about such ecological tax reform for years, but it's still some way off.
Martin Wright is editor-in-chief of Green Futures, greenfutures.org.uk
SIX STEPS TO A CLEARER CONSCIENCE
• "Too cheap to be true" can mean "too cheap to be good". If the T-shirt only costs £2, you can bet that only a few pence of that, if any, goes to the person (possibly a child or a woman in bonded labour) who actually made it.
• Look for the labels: Fairtrade for coffee, tea, chocolate, fruit, flowers, clothes; Soil Association for organics; Marine Stewardship Council for (sustainably sourced) fish; and Forest Stewardship Council for paper and timber products.
• Shop local: buy fresh food from farmers' markets, if you're lucky enough to have one within reach, or local, independent stores.
• Buy organic food, especially homegrown. Despite all the controversy over nutrition, the environmental evidence stacks up in its favour
• Relish the seasons. One of the small joys of a British summer should be the first juicy bite of a June strawberry. Buying out-of-season fruit just piles on the air miles.
• Use your tongue. Get into the habit of asking sales people and waiters if they know where that fish or frock comes from. You'll feel silly at first, but it soon becomes second nature. And don't take a shrug for an answer. Politely take your custom elsewhere. You'll be surprised how soon they get the message.
• Oh, and give yourself a pat on the back. You may not be on the barricades, but in lots of tiny ways, you're changing the world.
