Benoit is the director of Fair Trade Lebanon, to the creation of which he has actively contributed in 2006. Involved since 30 years in the field of international solidarity, he shared his career between France and Lebanon.
Fair Trade Lebanon initiative was based on the observation that Lebanese women of rural communities have strong but underemployed skills and potential. The founders decided to use fair trade as a means to promote local expertise in food processing and to generate revenues for disadvantaged rural communities by creating marketing opportunities for small producers and women processing cooperatives.
In 12 years, Fair Trade Lebanon has developed a wide range of products resulting from traditional know how, including olive oil, wine, preserves, jams, distillates… which are sold through the fair trade networks of outlets in Europe, the USA and in some Gulf countries, as well as on the Lebanese market.
Fair Trade Lebanon is collaborating with 50 production units – mainly cooperatives – providing jobs to 1.400 producers, including vulnerable communities (Lebanese and refugees).
Since 2014, Fair Trade Lebanon has developed a network of nine Fair Trade Towns in Lebanon and it organized the 10th International Fair Trade Town conference in one of them, Baskinta, in 2016.

Billy Linstead Goldsmith came to Fair Trade Campaigns from an eight year career in community organizing in the environmental movement where he recruited, trained and developed hundreds of grassroots organizers and facilitated campaigns at the national, statewide and local levels. As the first full time National Coordinator of Fair Trade Campaigns in the U.S., he has worked closely with the wide range of stakeholders in the U.S. and international Fair Trade movement, and collaborated with them to build an inclusive campaigns movement via the "Big Tent" approach outlined in the International Fair Trade Towns Guidelines. In his 7 years in this role, he has seen the U.S. movement grow to include Fair Trade Colleges & Universities, Fair Trade Schools and Fair Trade Congregations.

Billy lives in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania with his wife, Rachel and their new son, Jack.

I am Luis Heller, Administration Manager in Allpa, a Peruvian WFTO member. I am also a board member of WFTO and WFTO LA.

 Before Allpa, I worked in the corporate world as an Administrator for many years. I decided to change things in my life, move on and work in the Fair Trade world; I think it was the correct decision.

Working in Allpa for 12 years and working in WFTO and WFTO- LA has made me aware of the struggle that a Fair Trade organization goes thru to be more modern, efficient and more socially responsible in order to get closer to the producer/artisans, clients and colleagues. Indeed, it is hard work done with a team effort approach: sharing ideas of innovation, following the principles of our organization WFTO, and the commitment to provide high quality products to our customers from the Fair Trade or conventional market.

I accepted the position in WFTO LA and the WFTO Board to learn more from our movement and bring our ideas to it. 

I see our work in Fair Trade Towns and now on the Int. Fair Trade Towns Steering Commitee as a challenge to make our region and the global organization closer to make our objectives as only one. Our regions have different particularities and that is what make us unique; but at the end, we only have one Main Objective: to make Fair Trade and Fair Trade Towns globally stronger.

Our job in the global south, in this case LA is in partnership with CLAC, SPP and WFTO LA. It is very important to bring the position of producers and artisans to the table of progress and integration of North and South. To me we are a global movement, not north and south separate; but, one social movement.

Tadeusz is a Fair Trade Expert of the Polish Fair Trade Association;  national coordinator of Fair Trade Campaign in Poland; former member of the Board of Directors for WFTO-Europe;  coordinator of the program Have a Heart adoption” of "Maitri" Movement Poland (sponsorship of orphans and children from poverty stricken families in Africa and Asia); Master’s degree in Political Science and used to be an entrepreneur for 20 years.