Stories of Change

Mestoyet dreams of working in a job that tackles gender issues. To pursue such a career, she will need to keep studying beyond grade 8 – the highest level that her school currently offers. But thanks to fair trade this remains a possibility.

Each week day morning, in the mountainous Yirgacheffe region of southern Ethiopia, Mestoyet Feyesa, pictured here, collects her schoolbooks and begins the two and a half hour journey on foot to school. Mestoyet is one of the lucky ones. In many parts of rural Ethiopia, schools do not exist at all; of those that do, many do not progress beyond primary school age. This means walking long distances to the nearest school, or missing out altogether.

Mestoyet’s family belongs to the Keleltu Hasegola coffee-growing co-operative, one of many such groups selling coffee through the Oromia Coffee Farmers Co-operative Union from which Trade Aid buys most of its Ethiopian coffee.

With the support of Trade Aid and other like-minded traders these groups have been able to use community funding to build new schools and classrooms (when a community funds its own school, the Ethiopian Government resources it with textbooks and teachers). As a result of this development, many thousands of rural children in Ethiopia are continuing or resuming their studies in a bid to pursue a career outside of subsistence agriculture. Girls and boys are now leaving school with the hope of a new future within their communities’ futures as teachers, nurses, or doctors.

Already Oromia coffee co-operatives in other regions have been using fair trade premiums to build high schools. Despite the daily five-hour round trip, Mestoyet is hopeful that plans to extend her school will also eventuate.