Take a Step for Fairtrade and you never know what will happen

Step One - Harry Hill visits smallholder peanuts in Malawi and decides to launch Harry's Nuts!, an extra-tasty Fairtrade version of his favourite snack - salted peanuts. Harry doesn't make money for himself from this - he does it to help the farmers to sell their nuts for better prices to a secure market.

Step Two
London based fair trade organisation Twin is working with the farmers to make sure the nuts are top quality and available in sufficient quantity to fill the packs of Harry's. It has set up a company in the UK , owned by and run for smallholder nut farmers, Liberation Foods CIC. African countries like Malawi used to be the world's biggest peanut exporters but over recent years the USA , China and Argentina took over. Africa 's share fell from 75% to less than 5% by 2005. This was partly because of quality problems. The Malawian farmers and Twin worked together to help sort these out.

Step Three
Sainsbury's and Waitrose and other outlets sell 'Harry's Nuts!' Other supermarkets including Tesco and Morrisons sell their own brand of Fairtrade peanuts and raisins - supplied by Liberation Foods. The extra money which goes to the farmers from Fairtrade sales helps them to improve their lives - to educate their children, for example, and put proper roofs on their homes.

The communities in Mkanda and Mikundi have also been able to build warehouses to store their crops which save on rent and keep the nuts in good condition. These can be used as extra classrooms for children and to help villagers in other ways when it is not harvest time.

Step Four
Discussions take place about the sachets of 'Plumpy Nut' accredited Ready To Use Therapeutic Food which are distributed throughout Africa to help children beat malnutrition. The main ingredient is peanut paste - full of protein, healthy fats, vitamins and minerals. Could peanuts grown and processed in Africa be used in these pouches - rather than nuts imported from the US and other countries...?

Step Five
A spanking new factory Afri-Nut Ltd has opened in Lilongwe , Malawi , the first peanut processing plant in decades. This will be used to process peanuts for Plumpy Nut type sachets and for the export market. Malawian peanuts are back on the world map! Ian Barney, MD of Twin and a member of the Liberation Foods board says: "The factory has made me proud of the efforts of Twin, Liberation Foods and our smallholder partners in Malawi who continue to struggle against the odds to establish sustainable livelihoods for the millions of smallholders in the country."

Harry Hill says: " Many people think Fairtrade is just about bananas and coffee but there are many other products you can get. It's great that by going NUTS for Fairtrade big changes can be possible within just one African country."

And Chief Executive of the National Association of Smallholder Farmers in Malawi (NASFAM) Dyborn Chibonga adds: "A bag of peanuts can just be a bag of peanuts - or it can be a way of helping farmers to build a real future for their families and communities and help build a real way forward for smallholder farmers in Malawi."

Take a Step for Fairtrade is the theme of this year's Fairtrade Fortnight (February 27 - March 11), organised by the Fairtrade Foundation to encourage everyone in the UK to take a step for Fairtrade to help make changes in the lives of farmers and workers in developing countries, visit step.fairtrade.org.uk.