Reclamation Stations Make it Easy to Clean Up After Yourself

VICTORIA—Level Ground Trading is taking every parent's admonishment to "Clean up after yourself!" seriously through a new program that will divert the company's packaging from landfills and use it to create electricity instead.

Level Ground is launching Reclamation Stations at partner stores and cafés across Canada. Customers can now bring empty Level Ground coffee, fruit and sugar packages back to these stores and cafés, who will then return the packages to Level Ground for reclamation.

"Level Ground Trading always strives to do what's best socially and environmentally," says Rich Farr, Level Ground marketing manager. "So it makes sense to us to take responsibility not only for the coffee we sell but also for the package we sell it in."

Level Ground will pick up boxes of empty packaging, or arrange for shipment from non-local stores and cafés, which will be stored at Metro Waste's Victoria location until a full bale load has accumulated.

Once a full bale load of packaging is collected it will be sent to Montenay, a waste-to-energy facility, in Burnaby, B.C. Montenay uses our reclaimed packages, as well as other waste, to fuel a high efficiency furnace to create steam, which is converted to electricity using a turbo generator. Leftover ash from the process is used in road-building; leftover metal is recycled into reinforced steel.

A list of Reclamation Stations can be found at www.levelground.com/shop/store_locator. For information on the Montenay waste-to-energy process please visit www.montenay.com.

Level Ground Trading is a Victoria-based Fair Trade Organization whose mission is to trade fairly and directly with small-scale producers in developing countries, and to market their products in North America offering customers ethical choices. Level Ground has Direct Fair Trade relationships with producers in five countries: Colombia, Bolivia, Peru, Tanzania and Ethiopia. The company markets coffee, dried tropical fruit and cane sugar wholesale to grocery stores, health food stores, Fair Trade and gift stores, cafes, offices, health and natural food distributors and non-profit fundraisers. The company was founded in 1997. For more information on Level Ground Trading, visit www.levelground.com.

- 30 -

Media Contact:
Rich Farr, Marketing Manager
Level Ground Trading
(250) 544-0932
rich@levelground.com