Support for Fairtrade increasingly also means support for sustainability and actions to limit climate change. Consequently, it was the Wycombe Fairtrade Steering Group’s pleasure to be represented when Wycombe Friends of the Earth and the Wycombe Environment Centre (Refresh) celebrated their 20^th and 25^th anniversaries respectively at Trinity United Reformed Church on Weds 4^th November 2026.

Mike and Sheena King of the Wycombe for Fairtrade Steering Group were among over 60 people who attended this joint celebration which was marked by the attendance of Asad Rehman, the CEO of the Friends of the Earth organization. He delivered an interesting and encouraging message in that despite climate change being a global problem, he stressed the importance of local group raising awareness and engaging with local people through social media and locally arranged events.

Mike Chadwick, the former Coordinator of Wycombe Friends of the Earth from its early days, and Richard Andrews, the current Coordinator recalled notable events over the last 20 years.

Their latest campaign is focusing on the use of plastics and the increasing dangers of plastic waste.

Ellen Hawes from Wycombe Museum spoke about the Wycombe Environment Centre (WEC) and the vital groundwork achieved by Frances Alexander over the first 20 years of the organization. The WEC manages the Refresh store in Church Street and runs a well-attended monthly Repair Café at All Saints Church where clothes, electrical items, watches, and many other household items can be renovated.

The WFoE, WEC and other local organizations had information stall around the edge of the room  which included posters, flyers, and leaflets.

For the full report and images please click the link below to the recent Bucks Free Press article.
https://www.bucksfreepress.co.uk/news/26702339.wycombe-friends-earth-celebrates-20-year-anniversary

Mike King
Chairman Wycombe For Fairtrade

This is a summary of Wycombe For Fairtrade’s requested visit to St Joseph’s Catholic Primary School in Thame on 3^rd November 2026 to present two Fairtrade-themed assemblies.

A huge thank you from the rest of the Wycombe For Fairtrade Steering Group for Lesley Hatton’s and Sarah Moroz’s combined efforts on this.

Lesley delivered two engaging presentations to the KS2 and KS1 groups, totalling around 140 pupils, at St Joseph’s Catholic Primary School in Thame last Tuesday. The presentation had the right blend of facts, images, videos, a game, and songs, together with a very practical quiz which engaged both pupil cohorts.

Sarah masterminded the Fairtrade products shopping game which occupied the pupils’ attention and interest throughout.

The Deputy Head of the school, Sarah-Jane Morrissey, was very welcoming and helpful, as were the teachers we met. We were very impressed with this school, with both its equipment and the friendly learning environment and positive atmosphere. I think that Sarah Jane was impressed with the presentations and with the level of pupil participation. The children certainly sang the Fairtrade songs embedded within the presentation with gusto, and they were totally absorbed by Pablo the Super-Banana! Most of the pupils got all 5 correct answers to the Fairtrade Quiz questions, which underlined that understanding and learning had taken place.

I think that it was a win-win situation today – our presence helped St Joseph’s Catholic School along the road to achieving the next stage of their CAFOD sponsored “Live Simply” award, and it benefitted Wycombe For Fairtrade enormously by providing us with an up-to-date Fairtrade session within a primary school, which was part of our strategy to engage and introduce more youngsters to the existence and purpose of Fairtrade. The fact that we were requested by the Deputy Head to do another Fairtrade assembly in 2027 was especially rewarding, and hopefully, the images generated by both the Deputy Head and me will help to spread the word to other primary schools in the area. 

Lesley’s hard work in putting together presentations for two primary school age groups, certainly paid off and meant that we now have two valuable Powerpoint resources to utilize and repeat in other primary schools in High Wycombe, should the opportunity present itself in the future. We won’t have reinvent the wheel!

It was a very constructive and productive exercise today which more than justified the combined time and thought in putting these two 20-minute Fairtrade – themed assemblies together. Hopefully, the children would have been given their Fairtrade stickers at the end of the day by the teaching staff and over their family meal on Tuesday evening, pupils were busy indoctrinating their parents to buy Fairtrade products on the next visit to their Thame supermarket.

A big thank you again to both Lesley and Sarah for making this happen and giving Wycombe For Fairtrade a valuable opportunity to talk about Fairtrade to a whole primary school.

Mike King
Chairman, Wycombe For Fairtrade

Dr Favour (Ude Obidiya) Evwerhamre – Senior Lecturer in Business Management at Buckinghamshire New University gave the following feedback on a lecture delivered on Tuesday 27th October 2026 by Mike King, chairman of the Wycombe for Fairtrade Steering Group.

“Earlier this week, we were privileged to welcome Michael King, Chairman of Wycombe for Fairtrade, back to Buckinghamshire New University to deliver another engaging guest lecture for BNU’s 50 Level 5 undergraduate students studying ‘The Responsible Business’ module’.

Michael’s insightful session on Fairtrade and Sustainability provided valuable real-world perspectives, helping students connect theory with practice and better understand how ethical trade contributes to sustainable business success.

A sincere thank you to our students for their enthusiastic participation. A special thanks to Dr Gurpreet Singh for his continued support and commitment to creating enriching learning opportunities that equip our students to become responsible future leaders. The ongoing collaboration with industry and community partners is invaluable in enhancing the student experience and bringing responsible business concepts to life. We look forward to welcoming Michael again and continuing these important conversations.”

Members of the Fairtrade for Wycombe steering Group were at this event to provide visitors to their stall with information on the progress of Fairtrade In High Wycombe and the world as a whole.

Thanks to the generosity of the Co-Op and Christ the Saviour King church, a ‘not to be missed’ tombola was in action. And there were Fairtrade products for sale.

Wycombe For Fairtrade Steering Group members took part in this interesting all-day event along with many other voluntary organizations and stallholders in High Wycombe. The cold wind did not seem to put off the numbers of visitors attending. 

In addition to selling Fairtrade products (£150.00 approx), our Tombola stall had a steady stream of visitors. We were very grateful to the Mid-counties Cooperative for gifting us a £50.00 voucher. We used this to buy a range of Fairtrade products from the local Downley Cooperative Store for our tombola prizes.  It drew people to the stall and was extremely popular, generating great joy to the delighted winners.

Some winners were pleased to be photographed with their prizes. These are shown below and will be sent to the Mid-Counties Cooperative Communities Team, illustrating the joy and happiness this donation helped to generate.

Cooperative Fairtrade tombola prizes with donation gratitude notice

Family show off their Fairtrade tombola prizes infront of our stall. The father is a High Wycombe Community policeman who expressed an interest in working with us.

This lady was delighted with the Fairtrade carnations she selected as a Tombola prize.

This little girl selected this bunch of mixed Fairtrade flowers. Her mother informed us that she was going to give them to her grandmother as a present!

The steering group members of Fairtrade for Wycombe were pleased to work with Karen McNeil, the Community Manager of the merged Mid-Counties and Central England Region of the Co-Op, to publicise Fairtrade with the range of Fairtrade products that the Co-Op sell.

The promotion took place on the morning of Friday 6th March in the Co-Op store Hazlemere. Many shoppers were enticed to try the sample products funded by the Co-Op – all were impressed by the range of products and their quality. Some found themselves so impressed that they added to their purchases.

My Purchases

WORKING TOGETHER

Co-op are predominantly a members’ organization with a very good Fairtrade track record going back 30 years.  The Co-op were the first UK store to support Fairtrade goods and are the largest Fairtrade wine sellers.

This event follows the Co-Op helping to fund tombola prizes when the Wycombe For Fairtrade group ran a stall in May 2025 at the Pann Mill Open Day. The tombola was definitely an important factor in the high level of interest in the stall.

As a result of this joint event at the Hazlemere store, we have high hopes of collaborating with Karen again on some future projects. We are also to receive details of the ” Co-ops’ Fairtrade Treasure Hunts”, arranged with local schools as well as a booklet listing how the Co-op could offer a different teaching approach to those schools that had “Fairtrade” within its curriculum. We will publish info on these here in due course.

It was a very successful, productive, and constructive morning on so many levels.

The Christmas Tree Festival for local organizations at All Saint’s Parish Church, High Wycombe began on Thursday 18th of December and runs each day until Tuesday 23rd December 2026

Full details can be found at https://www.allsaintshighwycombe.org/treefestival.html

Wycombe Fairtrade sponsored a tree which we decorated with a mixture of hand-made decorations and those purchased from WFTO World Shops from Palestine, Nepal, and Pakistan.

Here are some images of our decorating team.

Sunday 19^th October 2025 from 10.00am.

Wycombe For Fairtrade Stall at Christ The Servant King Church, Sycamore Rd., Booker.

Wycombe For Fairtrade will be holding a Fairtrade stall of food and artisan products after the 9.00am and the 10.45am services at Christ The Servant King Church.

Wednesday 22^nd October 2025.From 10.30am.

Christ The Servant King Church, Community Café Fair Trade Quiz.

Mike King will be running a Fair-Trade Quiz with questions relating to Fairtrade products. The winning team will receive a Fairtrade  prize.

Friday 24^th to Sunday 26^th October 2025.

High Wycombe Twin Town Association visit to Kelkheim, Germany for the 40^th Anniversary Celebrations.

Mike and Sheena King are members of the HWTTA and are travelling with the Mayor’s party. We plan to meet with the Kelkheim Fairtrade Town Group on Saturday afternoon discussing joint Fairtrade collaboration projects, and even the possibility of a formal Fair Trade Town Partnership, focusing on promoting our respective towns, Fair Trade concepts, and friendship.

Wednesday 19^th November 2025 – Morning

The Mid-counties Cooperative are providing an opportunity for Wycombe For Fairtrade to be filmed at Hazlemere Cooperative Store promoting Fairtrade while explaining the details of how we fully utilized a generous Community Grant for Mid-counties Coop to fund a Fairtrade tombola stall at Pann Mill Open Day back in May 2025.

Saturday 6^th December 2025. 10.00am – 4.00pm

Christmas Craft Fair at All Saints’ Parish Church, High Wycombe. Fair Trade Stall with possible Fairtrade Tombola prizes donated by Mid-counties Cooperative Stores.

Sunday 7^th December 2025 from 3.00pm

The Mayor’s Festival of Carols. All Saints Parish Church, Church St, High Wycombe HP11 2DE. Wycombe Fairtrade Steering Group providing Fairtrade teas, coffees, drinking chocolate, and juice to participants and guests.