Java Justice
By Nick Berveiler
Do you just want a cup of coffee, or would you prefer some social justice with your coffee? ISU President Vic Boschini and Food Service Administrator Debra Grossman have agreed to purchase and sell Fair Trade Certified coffee through Brewsters Beans, a label owned by ISU.
Coffee is the second most heavily traded commodity in the world after oil. But the workers who toil in the coffee plantations of Latin America often endure harsh labor conditions and unpredictable commodity prices. Fair Trade Certified coffee provides farmers a secure wage to grow coffee beans and free themselves from dire poverty.
The United States is the world's largest coffee market, dominated by Kraft, Proctor & Gamble, Nestle and Sara Lee. These corporations have heavily advertised name brands such as Folgers and Maxwell House, along with low supermarket, gas station and restaurant prices, which make these brand names so popular that no one questions their dominating market power. While coffee prices have plummeted, retailers will still raise retail prices to maintain their needs in concept, financing, design, real estate acquisition, menu development, rent, staff, insurance, taxes, non-coffee goods and other expenses.
Illinois State University is one of the thousands of specialty coffee distributors associated with the Specialty Coffee Association of America (SCAA), a trade organization promoting high quality coffee to member businesses. The three largest U.S. coffee roasters each handle more coffee individually than the entire specialty trade of 1,200 roasters who together roast about 8% of U.S. imports.
At the same time the SCAA has built its niche market, Starbucks has become a high profile coffee retailer with 13% of the US market. Starbucks claims to be a coffee leader because it has the best tasting coffee, but the real push has been in advertising and expanding their operations around the world. Over the last 15 years, Starbucks has expanded from 17 stores in 1987 to 4,709 stores in 2001 and has plans to open 650 stores in six countries over the next two years. Starbucks also has a goal of 10,000 stores by 2005 and an eventual goal of 20,000 stores worldwide and a brand name as well known as Coca-Cola and Disney.
Coffee produced for Starbucks and the SCAA must meet specific demands of high quality and because of this demand, growers are able to charge more for their beans. Coffee grown with special attention to quality employs workers with reasonable working conditions in order to focus on producing high quality coffee. Although this coffee is not considered "sweatshop" coffee, attention is given to quality.
The coffee industry has buried information about the environmental conditions and farming behind cheap prices, convenience to consumers, superior quality and taste, and brand images. Some niche markets have been able to make higher profits for organic, shade grown or "bird friendly" coffee which has resulted in higher prices for the farmers and developing countries as well as visible marketing of growing conditions to consumers. Unless a consumer is looking for this sort of information it is unlikely to be noticed.
Fair Trade labeled coffee has a completely different approach to marketing their coffee to consumers. The emphasis on ensuring that workers are paid a living wage for the coffee grown is promoted along with environmentally friendly and high quality coffee characteristics. Fair Trade certified coffee has been popular in Europe for about 15 years and has entered the US market in 1999. With consumer support, Fair Trade certification will move into other industries such as tea and bananas.
Fair Trade Coffee at ISU is currently available for purchase in whole beans and served as coffee of the day. Because of rotating coffee schedules, Fair Trade Coffee will not be available as coffee of the day at all times, however it will receive equal circulation with other coffees sold under Brewsters Beans. If you cannot find Fair Trade Coffee available through a Brewsters cafe at ISU, please notify the employees working that you would like to see Fair Trade Coffee available as often as possible.
To promote fair trade coffee at ISU, Jim Goetsch, longtime Fair Trade Activist with Friends of the Third World, will speak at a Global Review on May 2nd (7 pm in the basement of Atkin Colby). Goetsch attended the first Alternative Trading Conference in 1977, helped found Three Rivers Co-op in Indiana, and in 1983 helped organize the first importing of "fair trade" from Nicaragua as a protest to the Reagan/Bush embargo. Jim continues to work with Friends of the Third World, which partners with 80 grassroots cooperatives in 40 countries. For more information about Fair Trade Coffee visit www.transfairusa.org.
