Coffee Guatemala Fair
| 3 Guatemala fair trade organic green coffee beans | |
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$17.99 End Date: Monday May-28-2012 18:50:28 PDT Buy It Now for only: $17.99 |
| Organic Guatemala Santiago Atitlan Fair Trade Coffee 1lb or 5lbs | |
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$65.75 End Date: Friday Jun-1-2012 16:44:11 PDT Buy It Now for only: $65.75 |
| Larrys Beans Fair Trade Organic Coffee Pure Guatemala Whole Bean 5 Pound Bag | |
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$74.08 End Date: Friday Jun-8-2012 18:28:44 PDT Buy It Now for only: $74.08 |
is fair trade coffee really fair?
was reading this blog about fair trade coffee:
http://www.coffeekids.org/blog/comments/guatemala-high-on-climate-change-list/
and in the comments people are talking about how fair trade coffee isn't really fair becuase its only a bare minimum for companies to avoid transparency about their buying culture.
does this mean fair trade coffee and beans like this:
http://www.coffechino.co.uk/products/coffee-ingredients--sundries/coffee-beans-traditional-machines.html
doesn't really count?
Define "fair". If you mean "paid something approximating a European wage", and you're not looking at hyper-premium single lot specialty coffee, your choices were and remain Hawaiian and Puerto Rican coffee; no other coffee-producing country must pay workers that sort of wage and none can without pricing themselves out of the coffee market.
If you mean "price-supported", then Fair Trade is the biggest price-support program out there with its minimum price. Fair Trade pays a premium (US$0.10 per pound for organic, IIRC) or a floor price, whichever is higher, and the floor price can be twice the market price at the bottom of a tremendous crash. Right now coffee prices are over the floor price. IIRC, the Fair Trade floor price might still be below the floor price while the ICO coffee cartel held sway; it was held constant ignoring inflation for many years, and this has come under attack from coffee producers.
If you mean something more complex, like a personal relationship between producer-seller and roaster-buyer with a minimal number of intermediaries, Fair Trade isn't it. There are a variety of programs that have sprung up to fill the "fairer than Fair Trade" niche; Direct Trade is pretty popular. Direct Trade will never grow beyond the specialty market because it becomes prohibitively complex when selling millions of beans; Nestle is never going to try to cultivate personal relationships with the millions of small farms whose beans go into Nescafe, but they might start buying beans from Fair Trade brokers and add some to premium blends.
So it's up to you to decide what "fairness" is. Price supports? Having met the grower? The grower living like an American? Something else?
| 3 Guatemala fair trade organic green coffee beans | |
|
$17.99 End Date: Monday May-28-2012 18:50:28 PDT Buy It Now for only: $17.99 |
| Organic Guatemala Santiago Atitlan Fair Trade Coffee 1lb or 5lbs | |
|
$65.75 End Date: Friday Jun-1-2012 16:44:11 PDT Buy It Now for only: $65.75 |
| Larrys Beans Fair Trade Organic Coffee Pure Guatemala Whole Bean 5 Pound Bag | |
|
$74.08 End Date: Friday Jun-8-2012 18:28:44 PDT Buy It Now for only: $74.08 |
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