Happy Earth Day!

Can we even say that anymore?

In honor of Earth Day, I’ve decided to work from home and avoid using my car. Here in Boston, it’s a beautiful, sunny day - not too much of a hardship to be sitting at my laptop on my back porch, cup of coffee in hand.

But seriously, like so many of us, I have been thinking a lot about my own energy use patterns and behaviors, and what changes I can make.

As an organization, we at Equal Exchange have also been thinking about our roles, contributions and responsibilities to the planet, our farmer partners, and our network of allies, partners, and friends. What kind of change can be achieved through consumer dollars and individual actions, and what kind of change can only occur when people are organized and use their collective power to enact or modify policies and laws?

“Who’s the fairest of them all?” The trials and tribulations of choosing a cup of coffee.

“We’re better than fair trade.” “We’re beyond fair trade.” “Ours is direct trade.”

If you’re a coffee buyer trying to choose your brand, chances are you’re familiar with these refrains. How, then, do we sort through all the seals, messages, and marketing promotions to make the right purchase? Clearly, we select our coffee by its quality, the flavor profile and roast, as well as how much comes out of our pocket. But for just a moment, if we set aside our personal taste preferences and economic realities, what do we look for next?

Is it the price which the company pays the farmer that counts? Or how many times the buyer visits the farmer and the relationship that is formed? Perhaps it is the size of the donation for a school or health clinic given to a farming community or a scholarship for a farmer’s child?

International Day Of Peasants’ Struggle

Farmers mobilize around the world and propose solutions to the food price crisis

PRESS RELEASE FROM VIA CAMPESINA

Small farmer organizations and their allies are today celebrating the International Day of Peasants’ Struggle commemorating the massacre of 19 landless workers, women and men struggling for land in Brazil 12 years ago. Today dozens of groups, communities and organizations in more than 25 countries around the world are organizing more than 50 actions such as farmer’s markets, conferences, direct actions, cultural activities and demonstrations to defend their right to food and their right to feed their communities.

Small-scale coffee farmers: trading partners or suppliers?

As a result of a reader’s comment to the previous story, I’ve decided to write a new entry which attempts to further highlight what is so important about small farmer co-operatives and what the differences are between companies who see farmers as partners and those who see them as suppliers.

The questions he asks give me another chance to talk about a group of farmers that has really inspired me and helped renew my conviction that the path we are on - weaving together good business strategies that support urgently needed social change - is absolutely the right one.

To me, the power of this story is in how clearly it illustrates the clash between two world views: the organizational development strategy of a coffee producing co-operative of small-scale farmers and the buying strategy of a large, multi-national coffee company. At Equal Exchange, we believe that these world views don’t have to clash. In fact, we built our organization on the belief that the success of our farmer partners – and our U.S. partners – is also our success.

Small Farmers. Big Change: A David and Goliath story of small farmer perseverance, co-operative spirit and pride, and willingness to take risks

What on earth is this Big Change that Equal Exchange keeps alluding to when we talk about small farmers? Why does Equal Exchange buy our products only from small farmer co-operatives? Why do we feel so strongly about supporting the farmers’ efforts to promote change in their lives, co-operatives and communities?

The following is a story about how a group of farmers from Jaltenango, Chiapas took an interest in growing organic coffee, overcame many obstacles, formed a co-operative, and then overcame many more obstacles. They found an important buyer to purchase their coffee and took a huge risk by terminating their contract when the buyer began to overstep its bounds and impose practices the co-operative felt undermined their development efforts in the zone.

Heavy rains and flooding in Peru

As if there weren’t enough happening in Peru, the country has been experiencing torrential rains, heavy flooding, landslides and mudslides in the central highlands and the jungle provinces that have caused at least 20 deaths, extensive damage to crops, and the destruction of many roads and bridges.

We recently received this brief note from Santiago Paz, Manager of CEPICAFE, one of our coffee trading partners in northern Peru:

“… as you know, in our zone we have dry tropical weather and for the most part, it never rains. Now, with all the problems associated with climate change, things have changed considerably and it’s raining with increasing frequency. During the past few days, we’ve been having torrential rains; for now, everything is under control, but if the rains continue it will be a complete disaster.

With respect to the strike (see previous post), it was called on a national level, but has been going on most strongly in other areas of Peru – so far 4 people have been killed. In the zones where CEPICAFE works, there hasn’t been much activity and our producer members haven’t participated….

Warmly,

Santiago Paz”

Peruvian farmers protest Free Trade Agreement

February 20th marked the end of a two-day national agrarian strike in Peru. Campesino organizations demanded government measures to alleviate the financial hardships small-scale farmers will face as a result of the Free Trade Agreement (FTA) recently signed with the U.S. Under the FTA, tariffs will be lifted on heavily subsidized U.S. grains, like corn and soybeans, creating unfair competition for millions of small-scale farmers in Peru. The strike began on Feb. 19, when farmers in eight departments throughout Peru held marches and blocked traffic. Four protesters were killed, hundreds of people were arrested, and the government declared a state of emergency in all eight departments. The following day, on Feb. 20, the government agreed to undergo negotiations and the strike was suspended.

Many of our farmer co-operative partners in Peru have been very concerned about the impacts the U.S. – Peru Free Trade Agreement will have on their members and other small-scale farmers in Peru. CEPICAFE, the Association of Piuran Coffee Farmers, with over 6,600 producer members, worked hard with Peruvian congressional representatives to improve the agreement. In the U.S., there was widespread opposition to the FTA from consumer, interfaith, labor, environmental, and small farmer organizations. Despite the many concerns that were raised, the Free Trade Agreement was approved by Congress in December.

To read more about the U.S. – Peru Free Trade Agreement, visit Grassroots International’s web-site: http://grassrootsonline.org/news-publications/articles_op-eds/

Fair Trade coffee co-operative in solidarity with unemployed farm workers

I would like to share a highly inspiring story from Nicaragua of solidarity between unemployed farm workers and a small-scale farmer co-operative that Equal Exchange has partnered with for over 15 years.

In the early 1990s when the coffee crisis was most severe, conventional coffee companies were paying farmers as little as 45 cents per pound. With costs of production about twice that high, plantations throughout Nicaragua were going bankrupt. Landowners abandoned their estates and many thousands of coffee pickers had nowhere to work and no way to feed their families. Malnutrition throughout the country was high and 14 children died in 2002, literally from lack of food.

How free trade destroys local economies, hurts small farmers and causes massive waves of migration

“There used to be one bus a day leaving this area (Esquintla, Chiapas) heading north. Now, four buses a day go to the border…. And each is packed with our young boys. Today, with the conditions the way they are, youth have become our biggest export.” -Miguel Angel Barrios Bravo, president of a coffee co-operative affiliated with FIECH, the Indigenous Ecological Federation of Chiapas, one of Equal Exchange’s trading partners.

“You can build the Berlin Wall. You can build the China Wall. The U.S. can build a wall any size it wants. But they will never be able to stem the migration north as long as farmers are hungry and have no way to support their families.” -Gabriela Soriano, CIEPAC, the Center for Economic & Political Research for Community Action.

In January, I took a group of Equal Exchange staff to visit our trading partners in Chiapas. We also met with local organizations in San Cristobal to learn about the current political and economic realities of the region. Our first meeting was with CIEPAC, a very active organization devoted to research, analysis, education and action. We have been very impressed with CIEPAC’s work and last year Equal Exchange was able to facilitate a portion of our profits to support their educational programs. Unfortunately, others find their work with indigenous farmers threatening; CIEPAC’s offices have been raided on numerous occasions and individual staff members have received multiple death threats. 

Why “local” and “Equal Exchange Fair Trade” are two sides of the same coin

Suddenly everyone’s talking about local: “Local is the new organic,” we’re told.

Farmers’ markets are springing up in food co-operative and church parking lots and on Main Streets throughout the country. More people are joining CSAs (community supported agriculture) and choosing locally grown products in their grocery stores. And as this trend continues, more and more consumers are starting to ask hard questions about where their food comes from and how its grown, who is growing it and under what conditions, and equally important of course, who’s making the decisions that control our food choices and who’s making the profits from those purchases?

The “buy local” movement implies that people are acknowledging all the hard work that goes into producing high quality, healthy, flavorful products and they want to support their local farmers. They want to know the farmers, how the food was grown and be assured that it’s both healthy for them and safe for the planet. To me, it says that we as consumers are choosing to re-personalize the food system; that we want to be a part of a movement that supports community and the planet and that we are ever more ready to resist the trend for corporate control of our food system and our values.