Posted on 01 May 2025
Dr.Susan Maiava, Co-Founder Fair&Good
What inspired you to co-found Fair&Good and advocate for ethical and sustainable trade in Aotearoa?
Many years ago, when I was a tender 24 years old with aspirations to make a difference, I went to ‘help’ people in the developing world. Instead it was they who completely changed my life and world view, turning everything I thought I knew upside down. Committed to development as my life’s work, I spent the next 40 years in development practice, academia and governance.
Over that time, I came to the conclusion that there was a glass ceiling in place, whereby, no matter how much good development work was done, if people were not able to generate a fair income, then development was ultimately not possible. Westerners were complicit in restraining and limiting development and perpetuating poverty and exploitation. We give with one hand (via aid and development) but take with the other every time we purchase a product where the worker, maker, farmer, producer is not paid adequately, is a child or forced labourer, or works in unsafe or overdemanding conditions.
So I co-founded Fair&Good in 2021 to facilitate ethical consumption as an alternative but parallel or complimentary path to development. Our online ethical directory fairandgood.co.nz has the potential for massive impact but is just the beginning.
What’s keeping you up at night?
As someone deeply involved in transforming supply chains and influencing consumer behaviour, what are the major challenges—or opportunities—you see emerging in the ethical trade and development space?
Development is facing huge setbacks. Years of progress are being undone. We have the 3Cs: covid, conflict and climate change. Now, added to these, we have cuts to aid and tariffs.
First is Elon Musk’s destruction of USAID. I’m gutted by the heartless and damaging cuts to international aid programmes. I personally know of programmes that have had funds withdrawn, good work stopped and hardship created. Everything we thought we knew about development is having to be re-thought, with a renewed focus on supporting local self-reliance.
Second, Trump’s tariffs are severely and disproportionately affecting developing countries such as Cambodia, Vietnam and Lesotho. The flawed logic that somehow these countries have been exploiting the USA would be laughable if it wasn’t so dangerous.
We are all feeling uncertain and poorer so the consumer behaviour change Fair&Good is seeking is getter harder and harder to inspire. But now more than ever it is the time for New Zealanders, who we know value fairness, to act.
Ethical consumption is the way Westerners can express their commitment to social justice and development when their governments don't or won’t. That is the opportunity: global citizens standing in solidarity with and empowering their fellow global citizens every time they shop! Facilitating ethical consumption is my recommended re-think of development.
And a third thing: Our failure to advance modern slavery legislation in New Zealand. Many people have been working very hard to get this through Parliament but as yet with no success.
Can you share a project or collaboration that you feel is shifting the dial in how New Zealanders think about ethical trade?
Is there an initiative Fair&Good is especially proud of right now, where you’ve seen a real impact either locally or internationally?
I’d prefer to shine the light on the local impact of the many ethical brands we showcase on Fair&Good who, although businesses, are also development agents. I am immensely proud of them all.
To name just a few: Karma Drinks (Sierra Leone), Recreate Clothing (Cambodia), Holi Boli (India), Bennetto Chocolate (Peru), Loyal Workshop (India), Ethos&Co (Cambodia), Waste Free Celebrations (Afghanistan), Heilala Vanilla (Tonga), The Lucy Foundation (Mexico), Rise Beyond the Reef (Fiji) and many more. All work closely with the communities they are immersed in. Read their stories on fairandgood.co.nz
This year we have formed a partnership with Good magazine to provide them with content. And we have some very interesting stories to tell! The stories are the bit I love best. I think that is the key to encouraging consumers to recognise the connection they have with the people who make their coffee, cloths, toys, phones and cars … and empathise with them as mothers, fathers, working hard to do the best they can for their families and communities.
With the global aid and development funding environment changing, how is Fair&Good maintaining momentum and engaging partners in the work?
It is hard. We have to think very strategically. This year our goal is to become self-funding so we can resource our future growth. We are now charging ethical brands a fee to be hosted on fairandgood.co.nz But to ask this of our brand partners we need to demonstrate the value we add to them. We are working hard to prove that by telling their stories and creating a community of like-minded ethical entrepreneurs through activities such as webinars where experienced business owners share their experience.
What does ‘locally-led development’ mean in the context of ethical trade, and how are you ensuring the producers and communities you work with are driving the agenda?
When I was in Bangladesh evaluating the success of Leprosy Mission funded microfinance groups, I asked group members what difference being able to earn more money made in their lives. I was given one of two answers: they were now able to eat three times a day (instead to two), or they were now able to afford the uniforms or fees so they could send their children to school.
What ethical consumption does, by increasing incomes, is give agency DIRECTLY into the hands of producers, farmers, makers and creators via increased incomes, bypassing even the locally-led ‘who’s making the decisions’ negotiation. How they chose to spend (or invest) that income is 100% their decision.
I might even say it bypasses the entire industrial development complex – it does, but I don’t want to offend anyone by saying that, because despite Elon Musk, aid is still necessary. Aid and ethical consumption are the two sides of the same development coin.
Yes, workers are still earning Western money from Western consumers (and the left still has a problem with seeing business as a potential force for good), but fairer incomes means less aid dependence, poverty, vulnerability and exploitation; and greater access, choice, development and prosperity on their terms, not ours.
It often also means the preserving and passing of artisan skills and knowledge to the next generation, albeit using Western designs to appeal to Western consumer tastes. Development always has been a process of negotiation.
If you could change one thing about the ethical trade and development ecosystem overnight, what would it be?
Sadly, the current climate has led to development being overshadowed by other issues. Can you remember the “Make Poverty History” campaign at the turn of the century? Nobody thinks about that now. Development and social justice issues are overshadowed firstly by climate change and environmental issues, and secondly by concerns about poverty, especially child poverty, in New Zealand. So it seems churlish to suggest that we need to lift our heads to consider global poverty.
Even so, there are several points of intervention: at government level (modern slavery legislation), investment in ethical companies, business supply chains, and consumer behaviour – which is where Fair&Good have chosen to intervene.
Our core logic is harnessing the purchasing power of consumers to reach a tipping point where retailers respond to changing demand by sourcing and stocking ethical products as their normal mainstream practice. The power of conscious consumerism lies in its cumulative effect. Every ethical purchase counts. The collective impact has real power to change demand, and demand change.
I would like to see consumers understanding and acting on the POWER they hold in their hands every time they shop. They hold the power to perpetuate exploitation and the power to stop exploitation; the power to transform lives – to really make a difference. If I could enlighten consumers with that understanding overnight … wow, what a difference that would make!
What’s your message to the next generation of ethical business and development leaders?
Assuming I’m speaking to ethical business and development leaders from New Zealand, my advice is ‘trust the people’. I have always been inspired by this 1972 quote from Paulo Freire:
“Some of the dominant class join the oppressed in their struggle for liberation ... as they move to the side of the exploited they almost always bring with them the marks of their origin. Their prejudices include a lack of confidence in the people's ability to think, to want, and to know ... They talk about the people but they do not trust them; and trusting the people is the indispensable precondition for revolutionary change.”
Over decades since then, massive strides have been made in moving from top-down, donor-centred to locally-led development. Although I say that with some hesitation. Yes, people working in the field are now mostly astute and capable people from that country. But, in the present climate of reduced resources, donors are requiring greater accountability for the use of ‘their’ funds, taking time and energy away from the good work itself. The strides to the de-colonisation of development must be protected and defended.
If I am speaking to ethical business and development leaders from developing countries, my advice is trust and believe in yourself. Development is a process of NEGOTIATION between Western and indigenous worldviews. Be confident on both worlds. That is your superpower. Apply the best of both. I like this quote from Sir Apirana Ngata (to a student):
“Grow up, little one, in the way of your day and age, your hands grasping the tools of the Pākehā for your physical well-being, remembering in your heart the works of your ancestors which are worthy of being worn as a diadem upon your brow; your soul ever turned toward God. Who is the creator of all things.”
Any books, articles, or podcasts you’ve recently enjoyed that others in the CID network might find inspiring or thought-provoking?
I’d recommend The Entangled Activist by Anthea Lawson, Perspectiva Press, 2021. It encourages us to acknowledge and examine how we are entangled in and contribute to the very problems we are trying to fix:
“It offers an eye-opening vision for transformative work by considering how unexamined shadows and assumptions impede well-intentioned goals, and how campaigners are caught up in the very systems and ideologies they seek to alter … To those who so want to help, it unearths a different starting place, one where transforming ourselves is inherently part of transforming the world.”
As a CID member, what value do you find in being part of this collective?
We were so pleased to have Fair&Good recognised by CID as doing development. I had not actually expected that to happen, because we don’t have development projects or programmes and I thought we might not be considered as doing ‘proper development’. So professionally it is the recognition of Fair&Good as an actor in development that really I value. Personally, I enjoy being part of the development community of like-minded people.
It also means that the brands we showcase are also recognised as doing development - development that places agency directly into the hands of the makers, creators and farmers who work hard to make the things we love to consume.