Green gift-giving frustrations

So the wonderful team at FGBI (now Eston College) just got word of their accreditation last week and I wanted to send them a big ol' bunch of flowers to congratulate them. However, knowing that most delivery-flowers are picked by slave children in south America (only a slight exaggeration), I wanted a more socially and environmentally conscious option. So I scoured the internet looking for Canadian eco-florists with either fare-trade or organic flowers and alas, there were none able to deliver to dear old SK. There are a couple of companies in Ontario who will deliver locally and there are several US websites what will deliver within the continental United States, but nothing (that I could find) servicing Saskatchewan. Boo hoo... so sad. But not really. I was sort of stuck on flowers because it is an easy generic gift, but it is such a horrible waste of fuel to send flowers half way around the world in the middle of winter. So I thought that a nice box of fair-trade chocolates would be a suitable (and perhaps superior) substitute. So I started searching and came up with a similar problem - lots of cute little chocolate makers in Ontario or Victoria etc. but none that would deliver. In the end I lost patience and went for a less glamorous but none-the-less trustworthy option. I ordered several fair-trade specialty chocolate bars from Ten Thousand Villages and had them shipped with a little note of congratulations. It is shocking how far behind Canada (and even the US too) is in terms of social justice. But things are changing rapidly and it is encouraging to see the emergence of more green and fair-trade businesses.