Fair Trade Coffee
Coffee is a beverage made from coffee beans, which are the seeds of the coffee cherry. The coffee bush, which produces the cherries, grows around the world in a narrow subtropical belt between the Tropic of Cancer and the Tropic of Capricorn at elevations varying between 2,200 and 6.000 feet above sea level.
The coffee bush is a tropical evergreen and would naturally grow up to 20-30 feet tall., however, bushes are typically trimmed to 3-7 feet to accommodate hand picking of the cherries. Each coffee cherry produces 2 green beans and it takes approximately 2,000 cherries of 4,000 beans to produce one pound of coffee.
Each coffee bush on average produces approximately 1-2lbs of roasted coffee per year. It takes a young coffee bush 4-5 years to produce it’s first crop.
- Coffee is the world’s second most valuable “traded” commodity, behind petroleum.
- There are approximately 25 million farmers and coffee workers in over 50 countries involved in producing coffee around the world.
- An estimated 11 million hectares of the world’s farmland are dedicated to coffee cultivation.
- Around the globe, the annual consumption of coffee has expanded to 12 billion pounds.
Did you know?
When you spend $5 for your pound of coffee at your supermarket do you realize that the coffee farmer receives less than 50 cents for the beans? When you spend $3.60 for a latte or cappuccino at your favourite café do you realize that less than 1 cent of that goes to the coffee farmer?
Fair Trade Coffee
Coffee was the first commodity to be labelled as “Fair Trade Certified” in 1988. This seal was offered to mainstream coffee roasters who were willing to trade even a small portion of their total volume on fair trade terms. This exposed the idea of Fair Trade to millions of consumers in the supermarkets.
Coffee is the best-known Fair Trade labelled product in the world. Sales of Fair Trade coffee have grown steadily from 11,663.8 metric tonnes in 1998 to 33,991 metric tonnes in 2005.
In North America Fair Trade coffee sales have also increased dramatically. In the USA, sales of Fair trade coffee grew from 1,263 metric tonnes in 2001 to 11,240 metric tonnes in 2005. In Canada, it grew from 258.1 metric tonnes in 2001 to 1,401 metric tonnes in 2005.
Unfortunately the amount of coffee traded under the Fair Trade label is miniscule in comparison to the total coffee trade - less than 0.05%. In fact, there is an oversupply of Fair Trade certified coffee - over 130 million lbs. is available as Fair Trade coffee, but only 30 million pounds of Fair Trade coffee is consumed worldwide. Most Fair Trade cooperatives sell a majority of their coffee at international market prices - that is, around 50 cents (US) per kilo as opposed to 126 cents (US) per pound for Fair Trade coffee.
For those 350,000 farmers organized in 300 cooperatives in 22 countries that are part of the Fair Trade system, there is hope, but what about the remaining 24.65 million coffee farmers? Some consider Fair Trade a niche market, but this is absurd! Trade is a fundamental process by which we interact in the world, if this is always to the advantage of a few, the gap between the “rich” and the “poor” will continue to grow and in which case is there any hope of lasting peace on our planet?
Mission House Fair Trade Guatemalan Coffee
Mission House supports coffee growers in Guatemala through a unique partnership. The coffee beans are purchased directly from the coffee growers in San Pedro Necta, Guatemala to ensure that proceeds of the sale of this coffee will directly go back to the growers and the local community.
This coffee is shade-grown without the use of any toxic pesticides or fertilizers in the mountains of the San Pedro Necta area. The beans are hand-picked by the Mam Tribe of the Mayans in San Pedro Necta. Then they are sun-dried, roasted and specially air-tight packaged in colourful cloth bags, handwoven by the community.
The coffee is sold online at www.gobiofood.com. What an innovative way for everyone to support the hard-working people in San Pedro Necta, Guatemalan through drinking their truly delicious coffee.
Facts and figures from Coffee Ass. of Canada and Fair Trade Toronto