What other options are there?

With the growing popularity and prevalence of fair trade products in the United States comes more interest and questioning of what exactly is categorized as fair trade.  Although it does provide members of developing nations the opportunity to rise out of poverty and become a part of an international movement, what is a fair trade farmer to do once this is not enough?  Once a farmer joins one of the fair trade cooperatives there seems to be relatively few ways of getting out and moving up.  The fair trade system then becomes a sort of binding unending agreement that evolves slowly and is reliant upon foreign interest.  What is to happen if the fair trade system ends up being a passing fad rather than a legitimate process to improve the lives of the impoverished members of developing nations?  The commodity chain of these cooperatives will most likely deteriorate and farmers will be left with nothing but debt and no way out.  Unfortunately, however, there does not appear to be any better options as of yet.  Perhaps the fair trade system will evolve to be less reliant on foreign interests and become a legitimate global characteristic.  We can only wait and see.