Cost of coffee.indd - RISC

offering advance orders will pay less than the market price – or pay using a credit note so the
farmer still has no cash.
page 20/21
Most of the world’s coffee is bought from coffee dealers, by roasters such as Nestlé. This
perhaps contrasts with the picture sometimes painted of commodity dealers making profits
at the expense of coffee farmers in the developing world.
This is an ‘Aunt Sally’. There is a true picture of coffee traders negotiating unfair deals with
coffee farmers; the issue of commodity dealers on the international markets is a reflection of the
fact that these people win (or lose) huge sums while influencing the world price of a commodity
on which millions of small farmers depend.
page 22/23
[It should not] be assumed that coffees which do not carry a fair trade mark are in any way
unfair.
… it is simply not practical to buy the enormous amounts of coffee required directly from
the hundreds of thousands of individual growers...
… we buy seven times more coffee direct from growers than all of the European fair trade
brands combined.
The fact is that coffees not carrying a fair trade mark are almost certainly bought at around
the world market price, and the farmer herself will have received much less than this. Some
manufacturers claim to pay ‘fair prices’ but there is no clear definition given and without a fair
trade mark, there is no independent check.
Nobody has suggested that any company buys direct from individual small farmers. In fact the
only way for farmers to get a better share is to work together in co-operatives that can negotiate
from strength, learn about the coffee market, provide support for quality improvement and soon.
Some co-operatives are now very large and professional and can do business with even the
biggest companies.
Even the biggest company could be buying some of its coffee direct from farmer co-operatives,
and paying a fair price so that consumers can make the choice between fair trade and
conventional coffee from the same brands.
page 26/27
Nestlé provided [Thailand] with 20 different types of robusta coffee plants, from various
countries… We have worked in a similar way with the authorities in China, the Philippines
and Mexico.
The increasing production (usually on plantations) in Asia is undermining the market for African
producers, nearly all of whom are small farmers. It may be in the interests of consumers to
encourage low cost producers, but it certainly does not help the poorest continent to develop.
illustration: Maurizio Forestieri, from For a few pesos more
video – www.bafts.org.uk
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