Bristol may have pronounced itself a Fairtrade City but someone had forgotten to tell Dave Michaels.

I accosted Michaels down by the docks as he enjoyed the Saturday morning sunshine. "I'm here from the newspapers to find out about Bristol, the Fairtrade City," I announced.

"Who Fairtrade City?" the 52-year old replied in his slow west country drawl. "I know Bristol but I don't know about that. Ain't got a clue."

Surely Bristol City council had told its citizens about its new-found status?

"I know it's about coffee and, um, grapes," said Michaels. "But I don't know what I'm buying half the time."

The council had sounded as pleased as punch - if not a touch self-satisfied - when it revealed its new honour last month.

"Bristol City Council in partnership with the Bristol Fairtrade Network is delighted to announce the city's success," it said. "Bristolians are very lucky . . . Bristol succeeded in achieving Fairtrade status by meeting strict criteria . . . the city boasts 26 cafés that are registered as complying with the Fairtrade requirements and 69 retail outlets."

But the news is taking its time to filter down. The previous night, my request for a Fairtrade lemon in my gin and tonic had been met by the barmaid with suspicion, if not hostility.

Almost 100 outlets in Bristol may indeed stock Fairtrade products. But to win this accolade they only need a minimum of two product lines each.

As website Bristol Indymedia says: "It gives the (false) impression that there is far more Fairtrade produce readily available in Bristol than there actually is."

David Bishop, supping a morning pint at the Bag O'Nails in Hotwells, not far from the centre sounded unimpressed.

Bishop, an aerospace buyer, did not have much time for the concept; even in relation to his own business. "Do you think we should be selling arms to Indonesia, China, Burma, Zimbabwe?" I asked.

"It's a world market," he replied. "We should sell to anyone who wants to buy. What's more, I'm suspicious about your motives. This is the best pub in Bristol and you're drinking lemonade."

To understand Bristol's rebranding one must consider its historic significance as a centre of the slave trade. Many landmarks stand as testament to its past; Blackboy Hill and Whiteladies Road in Clifton, the Colston Hall (built by a slave trader) and the new Pero's bridge, named after a slave boy.

Not that this is dwelled on by the Bristol City Council website, which tells readers how the city's prosperity was founded on "commodities such as sugar, cocoa, tea and bananas".

But given its slavery background, "Bristol and Fairtrade" would appear to go together about as easily as "Glasgow and Salad" or "Norwich and Reggae".

Perhaps this is all about the city making amends for its past?

Anney Gray, an old-aged pensioner,was unsympathetic. "People say you should feel terrible about it [the slave trade] but I don't," she explained. "The coloureds - sorry, the blacks - are still doing it to themselves in some countries."

My search for Fairtrade was going badly, and it was time to take some local advice. I asked my host Anthony Durston - who used to work for a furniture recycling charity - to direct me towards the type of people who bought ethical stuff. "They don't have to be totally smug," I said.

Anthony directed me towards Bi-Hand, a dinky shop in the centre selling handmade crafts and arts.

I seemed to have hit the jackpot when Simon Carson, the owner, told me about Bi-Hand's £9.50 watering cans made from old tin cans by indigenous Thais.

But even he seemed gloomy about Fairtrade. "If you're talking about overseas Fairtrade, food-wise I suppose it is always controlled by supermarkets, isn't it?" he mused. "You don't see a lot of Fairtrade about."

Time was passing quickly and still I had not seen the famous blue, green and black logo on any shop door. Ironically, it was on Park Street, at the entrance to Starbucks, the coffee giant, that I spotted my first one. Andrea, the Starbucks manager, had been trained well and knew her stuff.

Given the choice between Fairtrade and other coffee, she said, most customers went for the former. I got slightly lost at the point where she explained the difference between ethical coffee (where the grower gets $1.21 per lb) and Fairtrade coffee (where he gets $1.26) but I left feeling more optimistic about the council's crusade. Even more so when I went across the road to Boston Tea Party, a trendy hangout, and found not only coffee that was "40 per cent Fairtrade" but even some that was "100 per cent Fairtrade".

And when we met Ken Hayward, a 40-year-old software developer, it seemed that maybe the council was not jumping on an inert bandwagon.

"There is a strong populace which is interested in Fairtrade products," he said. "Friends of ours run an organic nursery down the road, there is the farmers' market and the Soil Association is based here." On close questioning Hayward admitted that none of these were Fairtrade as such. But it was good to know that there were right-on people in Bristol who cared.

Into this category one would be reluctant to put legal worker George, drinking a pint at the Myrtle Tree pub. George was grumpy because his bosses had removed his nice free PG Tips and Twinings and replaced them with Fairtrade substitutes.

"I wouldn't say it was gross," he said, charitably. "It's palatable. But Bristol City Council is so bloody left-wing it is unbelievable. They have spent hundreds of thousands in grants to lesbians, gays, blacks, ethnic minorities. If you want to make it in this city you have to be a black lesbian one-parent family… if you're black and want a new swimming pool they'll give it to you."

Did the Myrtle Tree sell Fairtrade products, I asked George. "Not now," he suggested. "But one day, when the Nigerians own it, they'll probably make us all drink palm wine." He added, in case I had missed his point, "That's what they drink over there."

Additional reporting: Anthony Durston