“Sustainable” is actually quite a curious terminology. Not least for wine. Sometimes it is used as some kind of “super category” embracing everything that is organic, environmentally friendly and sometimes even “ethical”. At other occasions it is used to describe a more narrow type of work practices that take into consideration the environmental effect of things, and yet in other contexts it can be uses for things that don’t fit comfortably into any other category (e.g. “organic”).
“Fair Trade” is also quite vague but in a different way. Usually it has to do with that you pay a certain minimum level of wages, offer good working conditions, do not use child labour etc.
Both sustainable and fair trade is often in a knee-jerk reaction seen as something positive, but that is not necessarily the case. The question is not so simple that a certain label is always ethically better.
Read more here: Sustainable” and “Fair Trade”. What is it? Does it make sense?
