Paul Rice

After college, Rice bought a one-way ticket to Nicaragua to work with smallholder farmers, thinking he would stay only one year.[16] As it turned out, Nicaragua became home to Rice for 11 years. There, he became a specialist in rural economic and cooperative development.[17] Traveling throughout the country, he helped hundreds of smallholder farmers organize cooperatives.[11]

In 1990, still in Nicaragua, Rice founded PRODECOOP, the country's first Fair Trade, organic coffee export cooperative. Within three years, the coop grew from 24 families to over 3,000.[18] Through the cooperative, these farmers got direct access to the global market and received higher compensation for their work. The additional income enabled them to improve the quality of life in their entire community.[8] Throughout this experience, Rice became convinced that the market—rather than foreign aid—was the most sustainable mode of poverty alleviation.[19]

After serving as CEO of PRODECOOP for four years, Rice transitioned leadership to a native woman who was the first female to lead a coffee company in the male-dominated Nicaraguan coffee industry.[11] PRODECOOP is now led by General Manager Merling Preza who is an advocate for the cooperative model, fair trade and sustainability for coffee families around the world.[20]

Subsequently, Rice served as strategy consultant and development advisor to 22 cooperative enterprises throughout Latin America and Asia, helping them become more competitive, democratic, and self-reliant.[21] His years of first-hand experience abroad in the areas of global supply chain transparency, social auditing, sustainable agriculture, and cooperative enterprise development led him to found Fair Trade USA.

After 11 years working with cooperatives, Rice returned to the US to expand the market for Fair Trade goods. The products would be certified as Fair Trade by his start-up, Fair Trade USA. Rice opened the first "national headquarters”—a one-room office in a converted warehouse in downtown Oakland—in late 1998.[10] He started off working with just a handful of mission-driven coffee companies. After gaining traction with coffee, Rice expanded the certification across new product categories, including fresh produce, spices, and cotton.[8]

Since launching the Fair Trade Certified™ label in 1998, Paul has helped establish Fair Trade as one of the fastest-growing segments of the food and apparel industries. To date, Fair Trade USA has partnered with over 1,500 leading companies, including Green Mountain, Nespresso, Whole Foods, Costco, Sam's Club, Walmart, Kroger, and Target. Fair Trade USA now certifies coffee, tea, cocoa, sugar, coconut, fresh produce, and seafood. Recently, through groundbreaking partnerships with Patagonia, Athleta, Williams-Sonoma and J. Crew, Fair Trade has begun certifying apparel and home goods, improving the lives of factory workers.

In 2022, consumer recognition of the Fair Trade Certified label hit 65%. To date, Fair Trade USA and its partners have generated over $1 billion in additional income for farmers and workers in 51 countries, allowing them to care for the environment and steadily improve their livelihoods. By offering these individuals the opportunity to earn a livable wage, Fair Trade USA has helps them fund a range of community development projects, including water sanitation, health, and education programs.[22]

In 2011, Rice came under fire for his decision to resign Fair Trade USA's membership from the Fair Trade Labeling Organization (FLO), the international fair trade labeling organization.[7] While FLO only certifies small cooperatives (in coffee), he wanted to expand certification to farm workers and independent smallholders that were previously excluded from Fair Trade. The move was controversial, given Fair Trade's tradition of working with small scale farmers. After the split, Fair Trade USA launched the “Fair Trade of All” campaign, an agenda for doubling the impact of Fair Trade and including more people in its benefits.[8]