Nico Roozen

Background

About Nico Roozen

Nico Roozen can be considered the founding father of the new Solidaridad and the visionary thinker behind its network structure. Since 1984, he gradually transformed a small Dutch church-related development organization into a modern civil society organization with a rapidly growing budget and staff.Roozen was the initiator of the first fair trade labeling initiative ‘Max Havelaar’ for coffee and bananas and founded fair trade companies like AgroFair and Kuyichi initiatives. He played an important role in transforming the Utz Kapeh company code into a CSR certification programme and the MADE-BY concept for sustainable cotton and textiles. Later, he joined or co-developed global Round Tables for soy, cotton, sugarcane, palm oil and livestock.Under the leadership of Nico Roozen, Solidaridad became a front runner in the area of sustainable economic development. Solidaridad works throughout the whole supply chain to make sustainability the norm and enable farmers and workers to earn a decent income, produce in balance with nature, and shape their own future.