NANAIMO — Amid rising costs and global trade trouble, more people than ever are paying closer attention to the country of origin of stuff they buy, with a local non-profit leading the way for almost three decades.
Global Village Nanaimo is in its 28th year of operating on the mid-Island, importing fair trade goods from around the world while emphasizing putting people over profit.
Executive director Joan Hiemstra said they’ve always encouraged people to think more about where their products are coming from before purchasing, with the current tariff situation with the United States increasing those concerns.
“That hasn’t always been because of the Canadian/American question, but more so the sweatshop versus ethical discussion. Knowing that it’s been ethically produced and it is providing important income stability and dignity is…a key byproduct of shopping fair trade.”
Global Village Nanaimo’s pop-up location at Country Club Centre is open again during mall hours until May 29th.
Hiemstra said that for some large global cooperative groups, Global Village Nanaimo is their only Canadian customer, providing stability to them with annual orders of products for the last 10-25 years. (Jordan Davidson/NanaimoNewsNOW)Hiemstra told NanaimoNewsNOW that even before the current political spat with our neighbours to the south, they managed to avoid the United States completely when sourcing their merchandise.
She said by speaking directly with the artisans and doing all of their own importing, they’re able to keep costs down while also ensuring the artists make money.
“We’re doing it the same way we’ve always done it, directly to the other country with as few duties, as few stops, as few hands that it has to go through as possible, and it can come directly to us. We want to cut out as many middlemen as possible, and we’re pretty good at that.”
Shipping products into Nanaimo from dozens of vastly different countries is no easy task, with Hiemstra and her team armed with a trusted broker to help make the connections.
Reducing the need for distributors and working with other fair trade businesses to share import costs, Hiemstra said that’s one way they ensure more money goes directly to the artisans. (Jordan Davidson/NanaimoNewsNOW)“For instance, the order we had in from Palestine last year took probably about eight tries before we got the paperwork right on that one. We just got an order for the first time ever in from Turkey…I couldn’t read it at first.”
She said working with countries that are less fortunate than ours sometimes brings painful reminders of how lucky we are, and the impact our spending habits can have globally.
“Raising awareness, raising consciousness, realizing that where you spend your money does make a difference, for every one of us. And maybe not everyone can be organic and ethical all the time, but if everybody did a little bit, it would make a huge difference to the world.”
Along with their twice-a-year pop-up locations in the spring and around Christmas, you can also find Global Village Nanaimo frequenting the summer markets around the mid-Island, as well as on their website, globalvillagenanaimo.com.
Global Village Nanaimo’s pop-up location at Country Club Centre is located near the former Atmosphere location.(Jordan Davidson/NanaimoNewsNOW)Subscribe to our daily news wrap. Local news delivered to your email inbox every evening. Stay up to date on everything Nanaimo and Oceanside.
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