Earth Week 2010

Last week, the BU Green Groups, Sustainability@BU, and BU's Dining Services participated in Earth Week in honor of Earth Day.

Events throughout the week included Meatless Monday at lunch throughout all the dining halls, free Bike Workshops sponsored by BU Bikes, a screening of the film Earth 2100, and a compost awareness day. (In fact, BU composts much of their waste regularly to Save That Stuff. Read more about what BU Dining Services is doing about food and sustainability here).

Slow Food BU participated in the Earth Day Celebration on the GSU Plaza last Thursday with environmental groups from BU and the Boston area. This year, we teamed up with Fair Trade Boston to bring students free fair trade banana splits, made with fair trade bananas from Equal Exchange and Ben & Jerry's ice cream. Ben & Jerry's aims to expand their full product line to Fair Trade Certified ingredients by 2013 as announced in their press release.

Other groups present at the Earth Day Celebration included BU Dining Services,

BU Bikes (with bike-powered smoothies, of course!), and BU's Organic Gardening Collective, among others.

As always, Earth Day was a great success, and the students and the groups involved in Earth Week learned a lot and had a good time. We look forward to participating again next year!

Talking Fair Trade with Ben Cressy

This Tuesday, Ben Cressy from the Fair Trade Boston Campaign joined Slow Food BU for a potluck graciously hosted by the H.E.R. House. Over a delicious meal, Ben talked to us about how he got involved with the Campaign during his time as a student at Eastern University, and about his work with other Boston area schools that are striving to include more Fair Trade products in their dining halls and on their campuses.

Students got the chance to pose questions about Fair Trade and the Campaign, ranging from how to generate student demand for Fair Trade to how labeling is regulated.

Ben explained the standards and qualification process for becoming Equal Exchange certified and about how sometimes smaller vendors skip the certification process because of cost, but that does not mean that they aren't meeting Fair Trade standards!

When in Whole Foods look for this logo!

He also discussed ways to generate enthusiasm on campus by hosting on campus events, such as an outdoor 'coffee house,' that engage students in the Fair Trade mission. Students discussed ways to raise more awareness on the BU campus and expressed interest in continuing to work with the Fair Trade Boston Campaign.

At the end of the night everyone went home with Equal Exchange goodies, yummm...

Thanks to Ben, Tyler, Rae and the H.E.R. House for a lovely evening!