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Show Monday, March 21, 2005 Business Editor: Candice Dallin Business Phone: 626-7624 Cell phones present driving hazard Students change world with chocolate Lawmakers seek to thwart behind-thewheel usage Club sells chocolate from Ghana to \ raise money for book scholorships By MEGAN PACE correspondent | The Signpost world ... and the effects of large societies on small societies," Eaton said. The chocolate helps them do just that. Doris Geide-Stevenson, An old Barry Manilow song an economics professor who declares that one voice can teaches International Finance, change the world. "We need just sheds a little light on this one voice facing the unknown," issue. Manilow sings. Here on the "Sometimes people confuse Weber State University campus, trade issues with the domestic that one voice belongs to the bargaining power within that Anthropology ^, country. Smaller Club. r} growers have less bargaining Sam Meek, f" power than the Anthropology Club > big cooperatives," president, uses :Geide-Stevenson his one voice to : said. help cocoa bean farmers in Ghana '•• ' Outside forces by selling Divine i T '•: can help to change chocolate. ^ the balance of power. Fair Trade certification Divine chocolate is guarantees a fair price so manufactured in London that smaller cooperatives are using 21.5 percent fair trade not undercut on price and ingredients - mainly cocoa beans from' the Kuapa Kokoo can compete with the larger farmer-owned cooperative in organizations. Farmers can afford to continue to grow their Ghana. . / The beans are Fair, Trade crops and contribute to the Certified', which meatiis Miat economy as a whole. "the proceeds are used to help "One voice facing the "guarantee a living Wage unknown" can help change - enough to make ends meet," societies from slavery to Meek said. According to Meek, freedom. Fair trade practices Jason Dabling and Victoria take out the middleman and Ciccone started the fair-trade return more of the profit to the . chocolate project several years farmers. The farmers are no ago as a way to support the longer slaves to the prices they farmers who grow the cocoa can get from a distributor. beans. According to SERRV Anthropology Club adviser International, a nonprofit fair Linda Eaton called the chocolate trade advocate, cocoa farmers "the flavor of conscience." Fair who sell at fair trade prices trade supports the simpler, receive four times the price less powerful societies, those of those who sell at world cultures endangered by market prices. Cocoa revenues globalization. constitute more than 30 percent "The students need to think See Chocolate page 8 about where they fit in the By LISA MANN correspondent | The Signpost Although bills to restrict cell phone use behind the wheel have been introduced to the House and Senate, as well as states and various cities, it is not uncommon to see drivers using handheld sets while driving. In the United States some 175 million people used cell phones as of January 2005, compared with approximately 4.3 million in 1990, according to the Cellular: Telecommunications & Internet Association. Cell phones play an integralrole in American society. "The beauty of a cell phone is, the freedom it gives," said Weber State University student Chuck Thorne. "To pass a law would defeat that freedom." The convenience cell phones offer must be judged against the hazards they pose. Inattentive driving accounted for 6.4 percent of crash fatalities in 2003 -"• trie latest""data available - according yp6 the Departmen t'jif Transportation. Inattentive driving includes talking, eating, putting on makeup and attending to children. "A semi-trailer pulled out in front of my car," said Weber County resident Dirk Talbot. "The driver behind me had spilled his drink, became preoccupied with it, and looked up too late." Increased reliance on cell phones has led to a rise in the number of people who use cell phones white driving. There are two dangers associated with driving and cell phone use. First, WSU Senior Cori Payne shows off her cell phone talking and backing up skills Friday morning as she backs up in the A-10 parking-lot south of (he Val A. Browning Center. drivers must take their eyes off the road while dialing. "There have been numerous tijnes when I've almost rearended people because I was on my phone, trying to dial or write info down," Thorne said.; Second, people \ can become so absorbed in their conversations that their ability to concentrate on the act of driving is severely impaired, jeopardizing the safety of vehicle occupants and pedestrians. ' "It's not the handling of the' phone that distracts me; it's the actual 'conversation and thinking that causes me to lose concentration," said Jolie HalesSkidmore, WSU student. Since the first law was passed in New York in 2001 banning handheld cell phone use while driving, safety experts have begun to focus on the problem as part of the larger one of driver distractions. In addition, they acknowledge that the hazard posed by cell phone conversations is not eliminated, and may even be increased, by the use of hands-free sets. "Be it hands-free or handheld, it's just as much effort to carry on a conversation with a passenger," Talbot said. A University of Utah study found that drivers talking on handsfree cell phones were less likely to recall seeing pedestrians, billboards or other roadside features. According to National Highway Traffic Safety, at any given moment of the day, 500,000 drivers of passenger vehicles are talking on handheld cell phones.This adds up to a lot of mil.es? driven by people who are not necessarily giving their full attention to driving. "In my line of work I'm commuting a lot, and my cell phone is the only way for my clients to get a hold of me . . . to restrict that capability would hinder work," Thorne said* A new study from the University of Utah published in the winter 2004/2005 issue of Human Factors, the quarterly journal of the Human Factors and Ergonomics Society, found that motorists who talked on hands-free cell phones were 18 percent slower in braking and See Phones page 8 heC ir. 'ho A-,-*lo-.3 Au-TOrVr*^ of f-*1 Vo! A brc-ft'v,? Cc>'C |