About 1st-nation
1st-nation is a new, ethically sourced and ethically produced cigarette brand, using additive-free ethically sourced tobacco, designed to benefit the independent farmers of Malawi and the native Mohawk manufacturers.
From the beginning, the vision was of a certified fair trade cigarette. But no fair trade organisation in the world currently has standards written to cover fair trade tobacco production. However, we are actively campaigning to gain accreditation as a fair trade company with fair trade tobacco products.
We are committed to behaving responsibly and aim to achieve high ethical values in the way we conduct our business.
The concept of creating an ethically sourced cigarette was the vision of Andre Rieksts, a native Mohawk American, and a lawyer, who had formed a close friendship founded on a common desire to help disadvantaged people.
Andre lives on the Akwesasne Reservation, a Mohawk Nation territory located across the intersection of the New York-Ontario-Quebec borders on the south bank of the St. Lawrence River. Deprived of their historical lands and the means to carry out their traditional ‘hunter-gatherer’ ways of life the Mohawk people, and indeed all native or ‘first nation’ peoples of north America have had a difficult time adapting to modern commercial lifestyles. In recent years a popular trade has been the trading and manufacture of cigarettes for the native market. A cigarette manufacturing factory was built in 1997. But it was only in 2006 that it gained a licence to manufacture for sale outside of Native Reservations.
Andre started the project in 2002. From an initial desire to gain access to a wider market, and so create more jobs for the Akwesasne Mohawks, the idea evolved to sourcing naturally grown tobacco from small, independent, ‘first nation’ farmers on an ethical, fairly traded, basis. Contacts with Malawi identified the existence of an association of independent farmers with traditional expertise of growing tobacco. Andre and a small group of investors have worked together to launch the ‘1st -nation’ brand of cigarettes, which will provide much needed financial support to two groups of native peoples on two different continents.
- In Africa, the purchase of tobacco from independent farmers in Malawi will generate funds to help small farmers in Malawi diversify into growing a wider variety of crops, reducing their reliance on tobacco which has become progressively less profitable for the farmers.
- In North America, the tobacco will be used to manufacture cigarettes by the Mohawk Natives in the Akwesasne Reservation, providing essential employment for members of this unique community.