WHITEHALL IS LEICESTER'S FIRST FAIRTRADE SCHOOL!

Do you remember the recent Echo cover with all the bananas? Well all Whitehall's hard work has come to “fruition”. (Sorry – bad joke!) Over the last year the school have worked hard and achieved Fairtrade School status – and is the first school in the city to do so!

With Mrs Ayre's dedicated guidance, the School Council and the Eco-Warriors have worked hard writing letters and having meetings, negotiating with the Bursar and school cook to get Fairtrade products used around the school and in the school dinners, and arranged the appointment of a Fairtrade Governor. They have run Fairtrade tuck shops and Year 5 have worked on a project called “Food For Thought” highlighting how Fairtrade helps the lives of farmers in Nicaragua. (Did you know that if we buy a non-Fairtrade banana costing 20p the poor farmer only receives one penny for all his hard work to support his family?) This was just one of the facts we learned in their entertaining assembly. They also had cookery workshops and made Fairtrade T-shirts in ICT. Oh yes, and that assembly where we ate 500 Fairtrade bananas!

Recently the school was presented with the city's first Fairtrade School certificate by Clare Carr from the Fairtrade Foundation. Members of the steering group told of the work they had done and Class 3 performed a new Fairtrade school song written by Mrs Williams especially for the occasion. Mrs Ayre was delighted to be presented with some Cadbury's Dairy Milk chocolate which is now Fairtrade! Tis move alone has doubled the demand for fairly traded cacao and is greatly improving the lives of many more cacao farmers and their families.

A good range of Fairtrade products is available from all of Evington's supermarkets including basics such as sugar, tea and coffee. Why not add a few Fairtrade items to your next shopping basket?

Addy Tyler