Posted Thu Jan 6, 2005, 3:57pm Subject: Fair Trade Coffee
I've recently learned a little bit about Fair Trade certified coffee. As I understand it, it's a system that pays more money for the beans so that the third-world grower can make an actual living from his coffee crop. This comes from charging more for the coffee than you would pay for similar non-certified coffee. It sounds like a great idea, but how is the coffee?
Advice from anyone who uses Fair Trade coffee is appreciated. Don
You might want to search our archives. This topic has come up before.
Some thoughts:
Most fair trade coffees don't do anything to encourage quality. However, if a small farmer can get enough money to live on and put more into his farm, the quality can improve.
Some programs charge the grower a pretty steep fee to participate limiting the ability for really small growers to benefit.
As an alternative to fair trade coffee, there are a lot of "relationship" coffees out there. A roaster or importer will negotiate directly with a grower or co-op giving them more money than they would get from a middleman. That has the same effect without the branding.
Growers generally get more for specialty grade coffee. Fair trade prices are better than commodity prices but not by a huge amount.
This program tries to put money in the farmers pocket by encouraging them to improve their quality. Some of the COE coffee's have gone for very large sums.
i'll agree mostly with what jim said, except to say that his point number 4 obviously varies with the level of the new york 'c' market. for example, a few months ago when the futures mkt was in the mid-70s the fairtrade guaranteed price of $1.26 was quite a hefty premium. now that the mkt is closer to $1.00 it's not such a bonus anymore.
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