At the end of November, the 4th annual National Fair Trade Days (JNCE) took place, an initiative of the Burkina Faso fair trade platform. Around 300 people took part in the event, including representatives from the private sector, ministries, producer cooperatives and support organisations. This initiative, which was funded by Enabel’s Trade for Development Centre (TDC), was desperately needed to tackle the many challenges in the sector and to find ways out of the ongoing crisis.
The Plateforme Nationale du Commerce Equitable du Burkina Faso (PNCE-B) was founded in 2010 and promotes fair trade, organic and agro-ecological products. It represents the interests of 70,000 producer members from 40 farmers’ organisations in the agri-food sector, the craft sector, the cosmetics sector and the textile sector.
The most important activities are capacity building for its members, advocacy, finding partners for its members (financial and commercial) and, since 2018, organising the National Fair Trade Days (JNCE). The 4th edition took place in Bobo-Dioulasso on 27 and 28 November 2024, with the theme: ‘Fair trade in the context of the challenges of insecurity and the consequences of climate change in Burkina’.
According to PNCE-B chairman Issaka Sommandé (photo), ‘these problems have a major impact on production systems, the livelihoods of farmers and the economic stability of communities. The consequences of climate change, such as drought, flooding and extreme fluctuations in temperature and precipitation, have serious consequences for agricultural production in Burkina Faso. Small-scale producers are particularly vulnerable to these consequences, which threaten their food security and livelihoods.
‘The uncertainty that has reigned in the country for nine years now has also confronted our members with a number of problems. Access to the countryside and raw materials is becoming increasingly difficult and some customers no longer want to sign contracts for fear that they will not receive what they have ordered.’
As a result, national and international sales markets are shrinking. An additional difficulty is that the lack of security also causes problems in the area of certification. Issaka Sommandé explains: ‘Fairtrade International has informed us that they can no longer certify new organisations, even if there is a demand for their product. I find that strange since it concerns the same area as producers who are already certified. Moreover, we only have problems with Fairtrade International, not with the organic certifiers such as Fair For Life or the World Fair Trade Organization. For four years now, we have been unable to get our new members certified by the most important fair trade label.
Synergies, innovations and advocacy
The National Fair Trade Days are an opportunity to try to respond to these challenges in various ways.
Firstly, by developing synergies between members. ‘Organisations that produce the same thing work together to fulfil orders from European importers. Secondly, by presenting innovations and solutions tailored to producers. ‘In the context of the fight against deforestation, for example, the government announced that subsidised gas could only be used by households and no longer by processors, whether it concerns mangoes, cashew nuts, shea butter, and so on,’ explains the president of PNCE-B. ‘With the support of our partners, we were able to set up an experiment, the pyrolysis boiler, at three of our members’ locations. Consultants came to present the convincing results of these tests at the JNCE and the government promised to make its technicians available. In the end, the government granted us a postponement to give producers and processors a chance to prepare properly. That is good news for the coming season.
This is also one of the very important objectives of the JNCE: to invite government representatives to publicise and promote fair trade. In 2024, the National Days were organised under the initiative of the Minister of Industry, Trade and Crafts of Burkina Faso. All technical support structures of the Hauts-Bassins region were present. ‘They encouraged us to continue the dialogue with the government so that it supports this type of trade. It is a very useful dialogue to clear up certain misunderstandings.’ The government of Burkina Faso recently announced that it intends to tax fair trade premiums, which are wrongly considered profit. ‘We have met with the Director-General of Taxation and her deputy and this problem is being resolved. From now on, accountants will be able to separate the premium from the profit in their financial reports.”
Dieudonné Sow, of the Trade for Development Centre, in conversation with the regional director of Commerce.
Numerous projects
The PNCE-B has no shortage of projects for the coming years. The chairperson mentions just a few. ‘We have developed a strategic plan for 2024-2028. To address the concerns of producers, we want to establish support centres for our platform in the regions: some of our dynamic members are located in the thirteen regions of the country. Representing interests at the governmental level is the second important pillar of our 2025 action plan, including facilitating the import and export of products, such as packaging, related to the production of fair trade products.
We have requested a meeting of the National Assembly in March to present the economic, social and environmental benefits of fair trade for Burkina Faso to our members of parliament and ask them to pass laws that support fair trade. We also want to promote the consumption of fair trade products in our school canteens and boarding schools…’.
A regional approach
West Africa has various national fair trade platforms that invite each other to their major events (the Guinea platform, the Mali platform and the umbrella mango organisation GUINEA CONAKRY were present in Burkina Faso on 27 and 28 November).
‘We were able to invite the Guinean fair trade umbrella organisation, which is not yet very developed, to come and see what we do’. For its part, PNCE-B participated on the same days in 2024 that were organised by RICE (the Ivorian fair trade network) in Abidjan. And since 2022, the idea has been raised to coordinate the fair trade platforms in West Africa – because isn’t UNIE strength and that together we can go far? But to bring this to life, we need resources, which PNCE-B currently lacks.
Few resources
‘In addition to our strategic plan, we have drawn up a plan for mobilising partners’, Issaka Sommandé explains. ’I hope we can find organisations that want to support us in implementing this plan because diplomatic problems between France and Burkina Faso mean we can no longer count on the Equité programme, which previously paid for an accountant and a project manager at PNCE-B level. That is why we are currently looking for funds to hire these two people. The operation of the PNCE-B is a major challenge for us.
Finally, the president of the PNCE-B appealed to everyone who can take action to enable the PNCE-B to implement its strategic plan. ‘We have a saying that a finger does not drink dolo (the local beer), but it can tell you where the cabaret (the bar) is. Just as a dead leaf cannot move without a little wind, our strategic plan will probably remain in the drawer if our partners do not support it.
