Eza fairer handel gmbh (eza)
EZA: Fairtrade buyer in Austria
At the heart of Europe, in the UNESCO World Heritage city of Salzburg, Austria, fair trade is a fabric of the culture. The city has a bustling sustainability movement defined by its use of renewable energy and hosting of international trade fairs. Meanwhile, the wider region boasts the highest concentration of organic farmland on the continent.
Leading this movement is pioneer EZA Fairer Handel GmbH (EZA), Austria’s largest import organisation for fair trade products. Established with the intention of creating an alternative trading model based on solidarity and transparency with producers, EZA has evolved to source an extensive range of products such as clothing, chocolate, coffee, cosmetics, food and handcrafts from over 125 organisations across 45 countries
in Africa, Latin America and Asia.
You can read more about EZA in QR 139.
Image: Producers at EZA partner organisation Aj Quén, Guatemala. Image credit: EZA.
Shared Interest and EZA
EZA have been a Shared Interest customer since 1999, utilising fair finance to provide working capital for producers and to pre-finance coffee and cocoa contracts. Despite its growth and expansive offering, EZA continues to collaborate closely with associations of small-scale farmers and artisans to advance sustainable food production and implement practical responses to the impacts of climate change.
In 2024, EZA delivered a project in the Rwenzori mountains of southwestern Uganda, in which 3,000 energy-efficient stoves were financed and installed for smallholder farming families. These stoves have reduced harmful smoke emissions, each preventing approximately 2.9 tonnes of CO₂ emissions per year.
Meanwhile, firewood consumption has decreased, helping to combat deforestation. Following this project, EZA launched an initiative to construct 46 rainwater collection tanks, creating a reliable water supply for smallholder farmers during Uganda’s dry seasons, which can last throughout summer and winter. The 2,000-litre capacity tanks have been installed at coffee washing stations and within local communities, improving crop quality and access to clean water.
Many families benefiting from these projects are members of Bukonzo Organic Cooperative Union (Bukonzo), a coffee producer supported by Shared Interest since 2014. Bukonzo supports the livelihoods of over 3,000 smallholder farmers among 13 co-operatives across the Kasese region.
Like Bukonzo, Shared Interest has supported bEZA with access to timely finance. However, as a buyer organisation, EZA utilise
a revolving buyer credit facility, which supports the pre-financing of orders from producers such as Bukonzo. Once the order has been delivered to EZA, they have a period of time to pay Shared Interest back.
Our relationship with EZA spans four decades, exemplifying longstanding trust and the unique impact of buyer lending as a means to support organisations at both ends of the supply chain.
Speaking about the impact of our finance, General Manager Michael Scherndl, said:
Invest“Through Shared Interest, we can reliably pre-finance fair trade products. This allows us to provide planning security, reduce financial risk, and strengthen our long-term partnerships with our fair trade producers all over the world.”