“We have contributed to bringing fair trade to supermarket shelves”

The fair trade brand born in 2003 continues to defend the quality of its products, such as chocolate, and its producers from different countries.

These are three friends who in 2003, at the age of 40, found themselves with the desire to “do something meaningful”, explains Christophe Eberhart, one of the co-founders of Ethiquable.

One of the friends has experience selling organic products in supermarkets, the other two have experience in the field. “I worked in a development NGO in the South, as an agronomist,” says Christophe Eberhart.

Something that makes sense will therefore be Ethiquable, a fair trade cooperative, which today belongs to 130 of the 165 employees, and generates 75 million euros in turnover.

The emergence of fair trade

20 years ago, fair trade was present in specialized stores “but we helped make it appear on supermarket shelves,” explains Christophe Eberhart.

Today, Ethiquable offers a whole range of organic products “including organic, fair trade, pure origin chocolates, with products from a single region and not a mixture like industrial chocolate.” For Christophe Eberhart, “consumers, beyond fair trade, adhere to this revaluation of the product, made by small producers.”

Because today the problem with cocoa is too low prices which do not allow producers to live with dignity. In addition to deforestation and soil pollution. The idea is therefore to do agroforestry so that younger generations do not have to cut down new forests,

Ethiquable highlights fair remuneration. “When the ton of cocoa on the market is around 2,300 dollars per ton we pay 4,000 to 4,500 for it. It is therefore more profitable for the producers,” explains Christophe Eberhart.