by Mike Arndt
For many of us, coffee is an essential part of community -- a warm, invigorating beverage to enjoy in the company of friends and neighbors. But it is also a vital source of income for thousands of small farmers and their families in some of the poorest countries in the world. And as the prices paid to coffee farmers have plummeted to historic lows, these communities have been devastated.
I learned about the Fair Trade effort at Kutz Camp, the NFTY National Leadership Center, last summer when I participated as a Heller Social Action fellow. After gaining the support of Congregation Beth Emek's Social Action and Youth Committees, I brought the effort to the attention of Congregation Beth Emek's Board of Directors in October. They voted to stock only Fair Trade coffee in the Beth Emek kitchen.
The Congregation Beth Emek Youth are now selling Fair Trade coffee, hot cocoa, and chocolate bars. An order form is included in this month's newsletter and can also be downloaded at http://www.bethemek.org/coffee.pdf
The crisis began in 1999 as world market prices for coffee fell from a high of $1.40 per pound to a low of just 42¢ by the summer of 2001. The impact on coffee-growing communities has been disastrous: Many farmers reported receiving as little as 15¢ to 20¢ per pound from local middlemen. In El Salvador, thousands of jobs have disappeared; in Kenya and Guatemala entire crops have been left to rot on coffee bushes; in Nicaragua small farmers set up shantytowns in the cities demanding government assistance; and in the Arizona desert, unemployed coffee workers from Mexico died trying to cross the border. While the headlines have faded, the crisis has continued into 2004.
"When farmers can't get a fair price for their coffee, it has a ripple effect in their communities, their country and even the world," says Erbin Crowell of the fair trade organization Equal Exchange. "Without a stable income, they can't afford to invest in their farms, they can't pay for their children's education, they can't afford medicines and they can't plan for the future."
Meanwhile in the U.S., members of Congregation Beth Emek have joined the growing number of religious communities in taking action. They are learning about the problems in the coffee trade and promoting an alternative: fairly traded coffee. Equal Exchange, a fair trade organization founded in 1986 to create a different model of trade with small farmers, imports the coffee. In 1991, Equal Exchange became the first coffee trader in the U.S. to adopt internationally recognized fair trade standards. Today, they are one of the few companies that follow these standards on 100% of their coffees. By trading directly, Equal Exchange cuts out the middleman, ensuring that more money reaches the people who do the hard work of growing and harvesting coffee. Perhaps most importantly, given low market prices, Equal Exchange pays farmers a fair price, including a guaranteed minimum of $1.26 per pound for conventional coffee and $1.41 for organic--currently well over world market prices. Because of its commitment to fair trade, Equal Exchange paid over $2 million to small farmers in above-market premiums in 2003 alone--income that provided small farmers and their families with a lifeline at a critical time.
"Thanks to God and to Equal Exchange, we are not starving," sayd Jose Luis Castillo Vasquez, a member of the Las Colinas cooperative in El Salvador. "We will not lose our land to the banks, and we can send our children to school." Jose's coop sold about half of their coffee to Equal Exchange last year, receiving $1.26 per pound. For the other half of their coffee, sold on the conventional market, they received less than 45¢. "I want to send my thanks to all of the congregations that purchase our coffee," said Mr. Castillo during an interfaith delegation earlier this year. "It is thanks to you that we have a seed of hope in our lives."
