Life is busy. Work, family, errands, hobbies, social lives — the average person rarely has time to think about the developing world. Generally, we leave global issues up to world governments but government priorities shift and at times international development isn’t as much of a priority as it should be. What can we do if we care about the poor of the world, but are unable to fly out to South Sudan to build schools? One of the simplest things to do is to buy wine that has a social impact.

Over the years, the private sector has understood the positive correlation between exercising corporate social responsibility and brand building. We’ve seen many companies begin to offer products where a percentage of the profit goes to charity. For instance, Lush Cosmetics sells a pot of hand cream where 100 per cent of the proceeds are donated to small grassroots charities around the world and the Tim Hortons Coffee Partnership supports small scale coffee farmers to build sustainable coffee communities. Overall, the private sector’s engagement with development only begins with charity. Companies are realizing that they must develop new responsible models of business in order to succeed, which means respecting human rights, paying fair wages and being environmentally and socially sustainable.