Looking Back and Looking Forward - Nicola

Nicola Taylor • March 8, 2019

Celebrate International Woman's Day

TODAY IS INTERNATIONAL WOMEN’S DAY

My name is Nicola and I have been with JTS for 2.5 years now. I started as the Admin Assistant and so if you have ever phoned our office in that time, no doubt we will have spoken at some point. I am now the Customer Relationship Manager and this is a job with many challenges but also brings much satisfaction, however I will be even more satisfied when the brown rice and organic coconut milk arrives! I love the ethos of JTS and really embrace what it stands for and what it is trying to achieve which, in a nutshell, is to work for justice and fairness for smallholder farmers in Africa and Asia, empowering them to develop their farms and communities, to bring food security and prosperity to their countries and to build a safer more sustainable world.

I am particularly inspired by the stories I hear from our producers and the intense hard work they have to endure on a daily basis, it takes superhuman effort for these farmers to earn a living. As today is International Women’s Day, I would like to use my blog to highlight two of the producers we partner with who focus on empowering women in their communities – Meru Herbs of Kenya and Eswatini of The Kingdom of Eswatini (formerly known as Swaziland – I like to think that the products are so good that they decided to name the country after them 😊)

Meru Herbs

Meru Herbs produce an exceptional range of ‘all natural’ jams and sauces made from the freshest herbs and most succulent fruits in the fertile soils of Mount Kenya (is your mouth watering yet?). It is a women led organisation in rural Kenya who are dedicated to the Principles of Fair Trade with a mission to:

Empower Women
Alleviate Poverty
Improve their Standards of Living

At the moment we import two sauces (Tomato & Basil and Tomato & Chilli) and two jams (Hibiscus and Papaya & Lemon) – the Tomato and Basil Sauce is a family favourite in my house and I always have a box in the cupboard for those nights when I just don’t know what to make for dinner, it is so versatile and easy to use in a number of dishes. My sons love it with meatballs and spaghetti, guess what’s for dinner tonight!

Eswatini

You may already know quite a bit about Eswatini as we have partnered with them even before JTS was founded. Our relationship with them has grown from strength to strength over the years and they remain very close to our hearts. I’m sure you know a lot of the Eswatini products, the jams, marmalades, chutneys, atchars and sauces; so as this is International Women’s Day I want to do a special mention for Sonia Paiva who is the Managing Director of Eswatini. Sonia is a formidable business woman and has won all All-Africa award as the leading woman entrepreneur in the field of agriculture and is also the first female Managing Director in her country, so she is a real beacon of hope to other women all around the world. Sonia also founded the Woman Farmer Foundation who’s mandate is to improve women’s incomes and promote sustainable livelihoods through agriculture. The Foundation focuses on women and youth empowerment and aim to equip, promote and advance through expanding their knowledge base, information dissemination and education and training in farming techniques. Every woman trained is required to pass this knowledge onto another woman farmer thereby allowing them to set up co-operatives and new enterprises and give everyone the same opportunity to learn, improve and increase their yields.

So these are two very inspiring women led / focused organisations to think about for International Women’s Day. We would love to see them grow and develop and realise their full potential in order that they can help more women work their way out of poverty towards a more sustainable livelihood. Ultimately, we want to provide them with a brighter future and the way we do that is by providing a market here in the UK for their products.

So please continue to support them by buying their products and give them the opportunity to thrive rather than just survive.

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Mary Popple retires as chair of True Origin

By Angus Coull • March 26, 2025

After six years of leadership, Mary Popple has retired from her role as Chair of the True Origin Board to assume the role as an ordinary board member. She leaves a legacy of steadfast, values-led leadership, resilience and commitment to Fair Trade during a period of significant transition for the social enterprise. First appointed to the True Origin Board in 2013, Mary became the first woman to take on the role of Chair in April 2019. Her journey into the position was shaped by a successful career in the IT industry and a passion for Fair Trade. Mary was an active member of the influential St Andrews Fair Trade group which successfully campaigned to designate the town as a Fairtrade area, and for The Open Golf championship to become the first UK sports tournament to commit to using Fairtrade products. This was complemented with over twenty years’ experience of involvement in other trade justice and development opportunities for women. During her six-year tenure as Chair of the True Origin board, Mary strategically led the social enterprise through a challenging external environment at a challenging time for many small businesses. Less than a year into her new role, the Covid pandemic emerged, causing significant uncertainty for staff, producers and customers as well as disruption in global supply chains. The war in Ukraine and cost-of-living crisis soon followed. Despite the challenges, under Mary’s leadership, True Origin generated over £2.3million in sales income that included £733,000 worth of Kilombero rice from Malawi. That’s equivalent to 245 tonnes or nearly 5 million servings of rice! The sale of the rice provides families in Malawi, one of the least developed countries in the world, with sustainable incomes and better food security. Mary played an instrumental role in rolling out the social enterprise’s rebrand and positioning the organisation as the go-to place for fair and fine products under the new True Origin banner. The product range subsequently increased during her tenure, solidifying True Origin’s reputation in the fine foods market. New products included a range of condiments such the soon-to-become both a customer favourite and one of Mary’s favourite products, sun-dried fig balsamic reduction as well as the popular beer bread of which over 150,000 packets were sold during her term. Mary’s leadership as Chair will also be remembered for her values-led approach, guiding the organisation to decisions with its founding fair trade principles in mind and the interests of producers always at the forefront. She invested time in expanding the board’s skillset and further developing the organisation’s robust governance procedures, upholding True Origin’s commitment to transparency with its stakeholders and leaving the organisation in a strong position to tackle future challenges. She also brought an instinctive knowledge of Fair Trade customers in Scotland and beyond to the role.

Looking Back and Looking Forward - Nicola

Celebrate International Woman's Day

Mary Popple retires as chair of True Origin

Celebrating International Women's Day

...But Give a Man a Fishing Rod

Schools! Take the 90KG Rice Challenge

An Update from the Chair and MD

A Statement from the Chair and MD

Living in Two Different Worlds

Jade and Nicola visit Turqle, Fynbos and St Louis

Jade and Nicola Visit some Eswatini Farmers

Jade and Nicola visit Eswatini Kitchen

True Origin is a JTS brand. JTS is a social enterprise (SC357178) wholly owned by The Balmore Trust, a charitable trust registered in Scotland (Scottish Charity SC008930). Website design by Big Front Door