ABSTRACT
The objective of microtrade is to alleviate impoverished populations of extreme poverty through international trade. Another important movement in international trade, fair trade, also shares this objective and strives to increase profits for producers in developing countries. As discussed in Chapter 1, microtrade and fair trade are distinguished from each other as the former focuses on finding and developing products that can be produced in LDC communities and would be in demand in developed-country markets, and the latter on setting better terms of trade for the developing-country producers with established trade channels. 1 Yet, both share the same objective (although microtrade focuses on LDC producers), and the concept of fair trade is closely relevant to microtrade. This chapter discusses the concept of fair trade, its relevance to microtrade, and lessons to be drawn from fair trade experiences.
