By Monique Buckner and Ritu Bhargava
Since the proliferation of smartphones around the globe, their unethical and unsustainable nature have been well-chronicled. Working conditions are poor. Child labor is rampant. Essential minerals are sourced from conflict zones. Since 2013, Amsterdam-based Fairphone has founded a movement showcasing the demand for fair phones.
Fairphone aims “to create positive social and environmental impact from the beginning to the end of a phone’s life cycle.” The company focuses on four aspects of smartphones to achieve their mission: developing a long-lasting design, utilizing fair materials, implementing good working conditions, and reusing and recycling electronic waste worldwide. These smartphones are built with reparability in mind – to improve their lifespan – with a modular design. Additionally, as gold, tin, tantalum, and tungsten are conflicted minerals typically used in smartphones, Fairphone designed a smartphone using recycled plastic, copper, conflict-free tungsten, and recycled cellular phones. In hopes to better the lives of factory workers, the company collaborates with suppliers to assess working conditions and take steps to improve them.
In 2014 the social enterprise began the Worker’s Welfare Fund in China; they held elections open to all factory workers (except senior management) and 18 representatives were selected to liaise between workers and management. The elected officials collected ideas and formulated proposals for distributing the funds generated by the first Fairphones and voted on which representative would become the Worker Welfare Fund board member. This fund obtained $125,000 after only the first round of sales and continues to grow today.
Although this modular smartphone costs around 525 Euros, it is not quite up to par when it comes to the screen resolution or sleek design of Apple and Android phones. Moreover, it is currently only available in Europe. The company believes the only way to make a phone truly fair is by incrementally producing and adjusting the phones while applying pressure on the supply chain. As they say, change doesn’t happen overnight.
