Happy Thanksgiving

We have a lot of thanks to give on this Thanksgiving Weekend.
First, to the producers we work with, from central B.C., to P.E.I., and south across the U.S., Mexico, Central and South America – nearly 200 farm vendors representing thousands and thousands of families. They struggle more every year with climate change, quickly changing markets, corporate consolidation, and currency issues, so we thank them for continuing to get up at sunrise, work to sundown, to provide us with such an incredible bounty, and still look forward to getting the first of next year’s seed catalogues in the mail. We also give thanks to all our customers, who continue to offer this beautiful organic food, but also to educate and defend organics in the face of media and conventional pressure to try to undermine all our efforts. We make a claim that organic is better – better nutrition, better taste, better health, and a solid commitment to agriculture that has a much lower impact on the environment in general – and a claim we have to defend, and vigorously. So thank you, for continuing to promote what we all believe in to your customers. We also thank you for being so accepting of our Fair Trade programs. As consumers demand more information, and a desire to have a closer connection with their food, they also increase their knowledge, not just of organics, but how food is bought and sold in the global market. Sales of produce produced in the Fair Trade model moves small, marginalized producers from a place of poverty and vulnerability, to a place of pride and self-determination. Fair Trade social premiums, built into the prices you pay, generate hundreds of millions of dollars every year, allowing producers to, in turn, be directly involved in financing much-needed community-based health and education infrastructure and operating costs that often cannot be met any other way, and in the poorest communities. Thank you again. As we celebrate Thanksgiving weekend with our friends and families, at the peak of our own harvest season, we can all give thanks to all producers, and your customers for their pride, commitment, and passion to produce healthy, organic food, and our heart-felt thanks to all of you for what you do.