All the fun of the fair

Dancing bananas, human sized tigers, a trio of jugglers and samba carnival queens were amongst the weird and wonderful on display at the Birmingham Fairtrade Fair held to mark the end of Fairtrade Fortnight.

Fair Trade Fortnight is held annually to showcase fair-trade produce which range from jewellery to jam and from clothing to coconuts and many other products in between.

University College Birmingham participated with bakery lecturer Dawn Gemmell baking and decorating a fantastic Fairtrade cake which after being on display was distributed between grateful attendees at the fair.

3rd Year Culinary Arts Management Student Ben Ebbrell was the winner of a competition held by Fairtrade Association Birmingham, which asked students to design a recipe using fair trade ingredients. Ben came up with a Honeyed banana and almond fool which he prepared and presented at the event.

Among the admirers of Bens desert was Andrew Mitchell MP For Sutton Coldfield and Shadow Secretary of State for International Development, he declared the recipe delicious and tasting all the better for being made using Fair Trade ingredients.

Fairtrade Association Birmingham member Sue Cockcroft explained what Fairtade means "The Fairtrade Mark means farmers in the developing world are guaranteed a fair price for their products, allowing them to plan for their future".

Other exhibitors included The Co-op supermarket, Tesco, Oxfam and Traidcraft. Visit the FairTrade website for more information.