The point is this, there is the principle of Fair Trade and the brand Fairtrade. One is a system of certification and licensing which often results in unintended consequences and the other is about fairness and buying on an ethical basis as a principle.

Fairtrade (one word) shows the outside world that you care. It proves it. It does create some quirky results. It guarantees a farmer a higher price than the commodity price of coffee, however he has to manage to get certified. A bureaucratic process that usually involves fees. This prevents many farmers from seizing the opportunity. Fairtrade comes at the expense of free trade. The poor farmer who never got a certificate is eternally prejudiced to lower sales prices and will have poorer workers. The exact opposite of the intended result.

Those of us truly indulging in speciality coffee NEVER buy commodity grade/price coffee and usually ensure the premium goes back to the farmer. This is the principle of Relationship coffee that we adore so much.

Fairtade certification does engage the consumer better however, and perhaps is the way forward if we are to get clients to care.

What should we do?

“But why Zane? How could you? You keep going on about caring etc etc but now you tell us this.”Their is a very good reason for this. The reason is because, and quoting the coffee genius James Hoffmann², Fair Trade is “the absolute minimum necessary to get people to stop questioning how you source, or pushing you to do better. Not enough.”³.

VERY briefly how I see it, there are two prevalent ways of trading coffee. The standard way whereby one regards coffee as a New York Stock Exchange Dollar value; you primarily look at and regard your self with coffee figures. And this is where Fair Trade tries to ensure a fairer price by ensuring that those who comply etc etc will get 15cents (US) per pound above the stock exchange price.

The second is “known” as the direct-trade or relationship coffee model. Basically, it is about cutting out unnecessary middle-men where possible and locate the source of the coffee whether it be a coffee co-op (several farms or a regions collective coffee supply that is collected together) or single-estate / farm in order to build a relationship with the farmer to team together. The emphasis here is not just on money but on quality and paying a good price for a good product, and looking at ways in which one can assist farming communities develop⁴. Benefits include paying the farmer(s) directly which means more money going straight to the farmer (or at least more direct). In general, most companies who purchase coffee this way have not paid less than twice that of the New York Stock Exchange price.

There are numerous potential problems with Fair Trade but, if you are interested, I can e-mail you two really good articles about Fair Trade (although they are slightly too harsh on Fair Trade and what it is and has done even if merely with regards to changing mind-sets and/or creating awareness). One reason that irritates me personally though is that if you have two farms next to each other and they are both Fair Trade certified, and the one farmer plants his crop and ignores it until harvest time while the other takes care of his farm as though it were a member of the family – i.e. producing much better tasting coffee in theory – once processed and sold, both farmers get the same amount of money per pound. Sounds slightly more like Unfair Trade to me.

A second reason: in a video blog I watched recently⁵, a very good observation and interesting point was raised with regards to the selling prices of general “run-of-the-mill” coffee and Fair Trade around Central and South America last year. For most of these countries, due to a huge drought in the general region, coffee was selling at quite a lot higher than, and at times double that of Fair Trade due to a lower yield and higher demand. Now what happened to the guys “locked in” to selling at the “better” Fair Trade price? Apparently what happened was that a lot of the farmers where sneakily selling there stuff off to other buyers to get the extra money and in deed they should. But this doesn’t happen all the time and Fair Trade pricing is often giving back more.

So, a late disclaimer just to clarify my feelings, I am not against Fair Trade if the farmer actually gets more than if they had to “sell out” the stock exchange way (i.e. what they claim they do) and this does happen quite often – my heart is for the farmer too. If I feel that the green coffee I receive is far more amazing than the “run-of-the-mill” stuff then my green coffee costs should reflect it. Both third-world farmer (and processor) and Western-world roaster can benefit from a really good product, why should it be just the end buyers who benefit? So if you are buying Fair Trade and it’s changing the lives of those farmers more so than before Fair Trade certification then great.

Interested in direct-trade or relationship coffees? Find out more from www.sustainableharvest.com.

Zane

“But why Zane? How could you? You keep going on about caring etc etc but now you tell us this.”Their is a very good reason for this. The reason is because, and quoting the coffee genius James Hoffmann², Fair Trade is “the absolute minimum necessary to get people to stop questioning how you source, or pushing you to do better. Not enough.”³.

VERY briefly how I see it, there are two prevalent ways of trading coffee. The standard way whereby one regards coffee as a New York Stock Exchange Dollar value; you primarily look at and regard your self with coffee figures. And this is where Fair Trade tries to ensure a fairer price by ensuring that those who comply etc etc will get 15cents (US) per pound above the stock exchange price.

The second is “known” as the direct-trade or relationship coffee model. Basically, it is about cutting out unnecessary middle-men where possible and locate the source of the coffee whether it be a coffee co-op (several farms or a regions collective coffee supply that is collected together) or single-estate / farm in order to build a relationship with the farmer to team together. The emphasis here is not just on money but on quality and paying a good price for a good product, and looking at ways in which one can assist farming communities develop⁴. Benefits include paying the farmer(s) directly which means more money going straight to the farmer (or at least more direct). In general, most companies who purchase coffee this way have not paid less than twice that of the New York Stock Exchange price.

There are numerous potential problems with Fair Trade but, if you are interested, I can e-mail you two really good articles about Fair Trade (although they are slightly too harsh on Fair Trade and what it is and has done even if merely with regards to changing mind-sets and/or creating awareness). One reason that irritates me personally though is that if you have two farms next to each other and they are both Fair Trade certified, and the one farmer plants his crop and ignores it until harvest time while the other takes care of his farm as though it were a member of the family – i.e. producing much better tasting coffee in theory – once processed and sold, both farmers get the same amount of money per pound. Sounds slightly more like Unfair Trade to me.

A second reason: in a video blog I watched recently⁵, a very good observation and interesting point was raised with regards to the selling prices of general “run-of-the-mill” coffee and Fair Trade around Central and South America last year. For most of these countries, due to a huge drought in the general region, coffee was selling at quite a lot higher than, and at times double that of Fair Trade due to a lower yield and higher demand. Now what happened to the guys “locked in” to selling at the “better” Fair Trade price? Apparently what happened was that a lot of the farmers where sneakily selling there stuff off to other buyers to get the extra money and in deed they should. But this doesn’t happen all the time and Fair Trade pricing is often giving back more.

So, a late disclaimer just to clarify my feelings, I am not against Fair Trade if the farmer actually gets more than if they had to “sell out” the stock exchange way (i.e. what they claim they do) and this does happen quite often – my heart is for the farmer too. If I feel that the green coffee I receive is far more amazing than the “run-of-the-mill” stuff then my green coffee costs should reflect it. Both third-world farmer (and processor) and Western-world roaster can benefit from a really good product, why should it be just the end buyers who benefit? So if you are buying Fair Trade and it’s changing the lives of those farmers more so than before Fair Trade certification then great.

Interested in direct-trade or relationship coffees? Find out more from www.sustainableharvest.com.

Zane