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the
Certification
CONUNDRUM
Are coffee certifications still important?
by Rivers Janssen
p h o t o g r a p h s b y Da n i Ca r lt o n
d c a r lt o n p h o t o g r a p h y f o r clipper coffee, m t . a l b e rt , o n t a r i o, c a n a d a
“The farmer wants a better quality of life. Period.”
—John Gaberino, Topéca Coffee
The true test for coffee certifications was
always going to come when the market
was high.
Coffee certifications came of age in the
mid-’90s. That’s when it became obvious the
industry had to address the social, economic,
and environmental issues surrounding coffee
production. Back then, the major certifying
bodies for the U.S. market—the organic certifiers,
TransFair USA (now Fair Trade USA), and
Rainforest Alliance—had a straightforward
incentive for coffee farmers: get certified and
earn access to a differentiated market.
It was a logical move for many producers,
as the “C” market price for green coffee in the
’90s hovered near $1 per pound, with a dramatic
but relatively brief uptick in 1997 (when
most certifications hadn’t yet built a significant
market share). It dipped even lower in
2001, briefly falling below 50 cents.
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The Certification Conundrum: Are Coffee Certifications Still Important? (continued)
For coffee farmers earning well below the cost of
production, a potential premium of several cents per
pound was at least a lifeline, and many were willing to
take on the additional labor, cost and risk of certifications
in hopes of making a better living.
But fundamentals change, and as of this writing,
the “C” price is around $2.64 per pound. Even 18
months ago, the price was $1.60, well above the $1.51
Fair Trade USA floor price for certified organic coffee.
And there’s no sign yet that the market is retreating.
Suddenly, some roasters and importers are wondering
whether certifications hold the same relevance
they did just a few years ago.
It’s a difficult question, because few roasters disagree
with the goals of the certifying bodies, even if
they don’t always agree with the specific standards or
strategies. But they also understand that growers by
and large have one overriding goal: improving their
quality of life. And if the rewards of the commodities
market are significant—or a coyote is offering cash
up front for a crop that otherwise wouldn’t pay off for
months—it’s easy to see why a farmer would think the
cost and labor of a certification isn’t worth the benefits.
All in all, it’s an interesting time for certifications.
High Demand, Low Supply
Pricing complexities aside, demand for certified coffees still appears
strong in both the U.S. and other major coffee markets. In 2010’s Trends in
the Trade of Certified Coffees, authors Daniele Giovannucci, Joost Pierrot and
Alexander Kasterine report that 16 percent of all 2009 U.S. coffee imports
had at least one certification, as compared to 8 percent worldwide.
Whereas certified coffee was once considered a small market niche,
the authors say that’s no longer the case. The report did not indicate,
however, how many of these coffees were actually marketed by roasters
as certified, as those numbers are more difficult to track.
Each of the certifications is enjoying individual growth as well.
According to the authors, sales of certified fair-trade coffee increased by
10 percent in the North American market (including Canada) from 2008
to 2009, thanks in large part to Fair Trade USA’s ongoing relationship
with such large roasters as Starbucks and Green Mountain Coffee
Roasters. Certified organic coffee, which enjoys the best consumer
recognition of any seal, increased nearly 5 percent in the same period.
By contrast, the conventional coffee segment is growing at roughly 2
percent per year.
The strongest growth, however, came from the Rainforest Alliance,
which reported a 28-percent boost in North American imports from 2008
to 2009. With Nespresso committing to a long-term relationship with
Rainforest Alliance, and Caribou Coffee pledging to offer 100 percent
Rainforest Alliance-certified coffee by the end of 2011, imports are
expected to continue growing in both Europe and North America.
Other certification schemes remain well behind these in the
North American market but are growing as well. UTZ Certified
accounted for 85,000 bags of coffee in North America in 2009—as
compared to 636,917 bags for fair trade, 703,080 bags for organic, and
432,035 bags for Rainforest Alliance. UTZ Certified is a huge player in
Europe, however, accounting for 1,155,000 bags in 2009.
Smithsonian Bird-Friendly, which is often considered a subset of
organic, accounted for 1,600 bags in the United States in 2008 (the
last year for which data is available). Similarly, the biodynamic label
Demeter accounted for exports of 5,000 bags in 2009, with markets
spread between Germany, Switzerland and the United States.
Even in a struggling economy, demand for certified coffee
among consumers still looks strong.
Supply, on the other hand, is tightening.
Al Liu, a trader/specialist in certified coffees for Seattle’s Atlas
Coffee Importers, says small farms and co-ops are being pressured
to sell their certified coffees to the conventional market, whether
through coyotes at the farm gate or large companies with significant
buying power. The strong “C” market is intensifying pressure on all
sides to procure coffee by whatever means possible.
This pressure is a particular concern among fair-trade co-ops,
which negotiate contracts at the co-op level yet rely on individual coop
members to fulfill the contracts. If those farmers are offered more
attractive terms by coyotes—and in many cases, a more attractive
offer means up-front
cash, not necessarily
more money—the co-op
can be left high and dry.
Because small farmers
generally lack the
financing to get coffee
to market efficiently,
they’re often receptive
to outside offers.
“If producer members don’t deliver, co-ops can’t export that
coffee as certified fair trade,” explains Liu. “Instead, the coffee is
sold to coyotes and disappears into the conventional market. So the
demand is still there and will continue to grow, but the supply—
especially right now—can get really tight.”
Producers and cooperatives also take on other risks when they
pursue certifications. For one, there’s no guarantee they’ll find
buyers for their certified coffees. That means they’ll either have to
sell the coffee to the conventional market or risk holding past-crop
certified coffee in hopes a buyer will eventually turn up. This makes
some farmers even more receptive to up-front offers from coyotes.
Randy Wirth, the co-owner and roastmaster at Caffe Ibis Coffee
Roasting Company in Logan, Utah, is a big believer in the basis
of fair trade: democratically run cooperatives, making sure that
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The Certification Conundrum: Are Coffee Certifications Still Important? (continued)
farmers receive a set percentage of the price,
no child labor, women getting paid equal to
men for the same work. “These issues are
as important now as they ever were,” says
Wirth. He’s concerned, however, at the
prospect of losing certified coffees he’s already
promised to customers—a situation that
buyers face whenever there is a strong “C”
market.
“It’s discouraging for a roaster who’s
worked for many years with a specific farm
group to all of a sudden not be able to get the
group’s coffee, or to receive poorer quality
coffee because your top farmers are selling
elsewhere,” he says. Wirth understands the
challenges faced by the small farmer, noting
that “it’s tough on the ground in these rural
co-ops,” which are sometimes located in
remote areas hours by car (on dirt roads)
from the nearest city. At the same time,
he believes there have to be remedies
to prevent growers from defaulting on
contracts, whether it’s sanctions on
the part of fair-trade certifiers or an
agreement by brokers to no longer buy
from certain farms.
Rodney North, the media
coordinator for the Massachusetts-based
fair-trade roaster Equal Exchange,
says there are a number of “complex
and nuanced” ways to handle co-op
defaults, but the most common is to
renegotiate the contract. In a period
of contracting supply, it’s difficult for
many roasters to completely terminate
buying relationships that have paid off
in the past.
Wirth notes, however, that defaults
are not the norm; many of his farm
groups are still honoring their contracts
and standing behind their co-ops 100
percent. But “when it’s bad, it’s really
bad,” he says.
Liu says certified-organic coffees
face similar issues, especially at the
small farm and co-op level, where many
fair-trade coffees are also certifiedorganic.
He notes that he hasn’t seen
as much scrambling among Rainforest
Alliance coffees. “I think that’s in large
part because most Rainforest-certified
producers are estates, and they aren’t
battling a situation where coyotes are
roaming around trying to buy coffee
from the estate owners,” Liu continues.
“The Rainforest market just isn’t
structured that way.”
Of course, supply issues aren’t
restricted to certified coffees, which
roasters know all too well. The higher
the “C” price, the less incentive a
farmer has to preserve high-quality
coffees for the specialty market. As Tim
Chapdelaine, the sales manager for Café
Imports in Saint Paul, Minn., explains:
“You have to take [potentially great
coffees], set them aside, send them
through a culling process, determine
whether they’re special, and then select
the good ones that meet the higherquality
criteria. And the buyer … has to
say, ‘Yes, I’ll pay you a big premium for
that.’ In this market, the incentive is
not as high as it was before.”
Wirth says a huge key to protecting
contracts is communication: between
the certifying bodies, farmers, coops,
roasters, importers and any other
principals. All parties need to be on the
same page—a process that takes time,
effort, and an appreciation for the
challenges faced by others in the supply
chain.
Monika Firl, producer relations
manager for a 23-member coffee
importing group called Cooperative
Coffees with offices in Montreal and
Americus, Ga., has a similar take. She
says that on-the-ground relationships
are essential when supply is tight.
“When you have an up market, that’s
when the relationship itself is going to
be tested,” says Firl. “If you have a good
relationship, and the buyer and seller
are concerned about each other, the
price starts to follow. But when price is
the only thing you’re focused on, the
challenge is greater. So much depends
on trust, communication, and the
assistance you can offer with hurdles
like financing. You have to go an extra
mile or two.”
Wanting
What’s Best
for the Farmer
“Higher prices per pound are only part
of the equation,” says John Gaberino,
owner of Topéca Coffee. Gaberino has a
personal interest in both the growing
and consuming sides of the industry,
as his family runs a roastery in Tulsa,
Okla., and a coffee farm in El Salvador.
“We in the industry normally talk about
how to increase the price per pound,
but we should really be talking about
profit per pound. It doesn’t do the farmer
any good to change his growing and
processing methods if he increases his
average sales price by 30 percent but
increases his expenses by 50 percent.”
Gaberino’s assertion brings to
mind a few additional questions about
certifications: Are they accomplishing
their goal? Are they putting farmers in a
more economically secure position and
leading to better environmental and
social outcomes? Are they a net positive
for the specialty coffee industry?
The term “hornet’s nest” was
invented for just such an occasion.
In 2008’s Seeking Sustainability report,
Daniele Giovannucci and Jason Potts discuss
a methodical framework that grapples with
the questions, while making clear that
they’re merely reporting observations and
not making conclusions. It’s worth noting
that the report came out prior to the current
market run-up.
Among their findings: A majority (60
percent) of the certified farms surveyed
reported an improved economic outlook after
certification, despite 62 percent of the farms
reporting lower yields. A slight majority (54
percent) of farms reported improved market
access due to certification. However, even
though certified farms on the whole had
better pollution management systems,
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The Certification Conundrum: Are Coffee Certifications Still Important? (continued)
it wasn’t possible (yet) to detect significant improvements in
biodiversity or soil health.
One inescapable observation was that certified farms have better
social systems in place. According to Seeking Sustainability, four times
as many certified farms have set up occupational health and safety
policies, and certified farms use written employment contracts twice
as often as conventional farms.
The authors make clear, however, that it’s way too early to make
definitive statements on the long-term impact of certifications: “An
apt analogy may be that we have designed a class of medicines, but
are not really certain of their full impact or to what extent they may
have unintended side effects.”
Talk to roasters, importers, and growers and you’ll get a much
more personal view. Often, the concerns are long standing, echoing
complaints that first arose over a decade ago. Rainforest Alliance has
long faced criticism for allowing its seal on coffees that contain as
little as 30 percent of certified beans, although that’s due to change
soon. The organization’s new standards will require all coffees with
the Rainforest Alliance seal to scale up a minimum of 15 percent per
year until they reach 100-percent certified content. This includes
coffees that start at 30-percent certified content as well as coffees
that start at 90 percent.
Gaberino isn’t a fan of Fair Trade USA’s marketing approach,
which he believes is misleading to consumers. “Ninety-nine percent
of the consumers I’ve ever talked to don’t realize that not all farms
can be fair-trade-certified, and that the organization’s goal is to
focus specifically on small family farms and co-ops,” he says. While
calling the small-farmer focus “clearly very admirable,” he bristles at
the implication that non-co-op coffees are unfairly traded.
The cost of certifications remains a sticking point, as does the
legwork that often seems incomprehensible to the farmer. And
many coffee professionals believe that certifications amount to
subsidies that distort traditional market incentives.
When asked how most farmers react when she brings up
certifications, Firl says they’re rarely enthusiastic. “Usually, there’s
sort of a long groan,” she says. “I think the biggest challenge for the
farmers is that the criteria are often established from someone’s
desk, using language that’s unintelligible to them. Half of the
challenge of the certification is the anxiety of trying to understand
what’s even going to be inspected. Add the cost and you have a large
burden for farmers.”
That’s not to say farmers are anti-certification, per se. Like any
diverse group of people, opinions vary dramatically. Some see the
cost of certification as a necessary investment in building market
access, while others
think certifications
are too much hassle.
Some are committed to
a specific certification
because they believe
in the certification’s
methodology or goals.
And many others are
simply too far removed
from the certification
process—whether because
of location, financial
situation, or other reasons—to
pursue certification at all.
Firl is also concerned that
certifications such as fair trade
are becoming a bit too broad
as they increasingly work
with larger companies. “My
understanding of fair trade is
that we’re trying to tighten the
relationship between farmers
and consumers,” she explains.
“That means bridging the
understanding of what it takes
to produce a good cup of coffee
and educating consumers on the challenges that smallholders face
constantly. But what I see happening over the last 10 years is that
we’re losing the communication as opposed to strengthening it.”
Firl uses the example of a talk she recently gave at a local college,
where she held up a bag of fair-trade-certified coffee. The problem,
she says, was that the fair-trade label was the only identifying
mark on the coffee other than the brand name. “I didn’t know what
country it came from, and I certainly didn’t know what co-op it came
from,” she says. “Unless I’m a student of fair trade and know exactly
what criteria is used for the label, I don’t know what’s behind the
bag of coffee in a trading sense either.”
Firl says she’s not opposed to large companies entering the fairtrade
arena, but she’s concerned that they’ll dilute the fair-trade
process by making volume more important than standards and
information.
Chapdelaine takes a broader view. He says that people tend to
view certifications through an absolutist lens: either a certification
is the ultimate answer or it isn’t. But he maintains that there’s no
savior in coffee, and that all certifications—whatever their faults—
contribute value. In fact, he says the specialty coffee industry is
fortunate compared to most industries.
“If you look at other industries, big companies just create their
own certifications or own them wholly,” Chapdelaine says. “Ours are
actually independent. There’s not one individual company that has
the power to alter a certification significantly in its favor. We’re a
uniquely healthy industry in that sense.”
And while he’s a big proponent of quality control, Chapdelaine
also points out that certifications add value to a coffee independent
of its quality, which is important because even the most successful
coffee co-ops and estates can’t sell all their coffee to the highend
specialty market. “A farmer needs to sell all of the coffee he
produces, and if he can raise the price on some of the acceptable
qualities that aren’t true specialty, then he can get ahead,” he says.
Certifications, Quality and
Direct Trade
Aside from associated environmental and social benefits, certified
coffees also offer a tangible benefit to quality-oriented roasters:
process and traceability. With certification comes documentation,
and with documentation comes increased attention to detail.
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The Certification Conundrum: Are Coffee Certifications Still Important? (continued)
While not a fan of every certification, Jim Kossolos, the coowner
of San Cristobal Coffee Importers in Kirkland, Wash., says
certifications in general have the potential to improve production
standards over the long haul, which could eventually lead to more
consistent coffee quality. “All certifications force a measure of order
into an otherwise chaotic system driven by commodities pricing,”
explains Kossolos. “The ‘order’ in many cases is directly related to
process control improvement, which leads inevitably to quality
improvement.”
Put another way, farmers have to assert more control of the
process before they can start improving coffee quality or boosting
market access. Certifications are one way that farmers can gain
that control over time, usually in conjunction with a buyer who
negotiates process improvements into a contract. Direct trade is
another, as farmers in direct-trade relationships generally work with
roasters to meet specific production standards.
Liu says a number of the small- to mid-sized roasters he works
with have dropped out of the Fair Trade USA licensing program in
favor of direct-trade relationships, while some larger roasters have
simultaneously increased their fair-trade volume. Liu noted that
many of these smaller roasters are still sourcing from fair-tradecertified
cooperatives (and paying the social premium), but are
no longer paying the Fair Trade USA licensing fee, meaning they
can’t use the official fair trade seal. In essence, Liu says, they’re
supporting fair-trade values on the origin side—often to preserve
relationships with certain co-ops—but are comfortable marketing
the coffee through other means.
Cooperative Coffee’s roaster members are taking a similar path.
Rather than buying through Fair Trade USA, Cooperative Coffees is
relying on Fair Trade Proof, a third-party transparency site. The coop
puts all contracts and verification up on the site so that anyone
can learn the coffee’s path and price.
Firl says Cooperative Coffees is sort of a fair-trade/direct-trade/
farmer-friendly hybrid. “Humanizing trade is important,” she says,
“and the only way you can do that is having direct contact, so you
can understand the challenges the other side is facing.”
Chapdelaine says it’s part of an overall awareness within the
specialty coffee industry that quality must extend throughout the
entire supply chain, because even a little bit of efficiency can go
a long way. “Just expediting the movement of the coffee from the
grower to the roaster can put a lot more money in the farmer’s
pocket,” he says. That doesn’t mean forgoing the time-consuming
steps required to produce high-end coffees, but making sure
those steps are part of a rewarding relationship for all the parties
involved, and with as few
uncertainties as possible.
But direct trade is also
limited to a large degree by
the amount of work required
to build a successful directtrade
program. Wirth loves
direct trade, but he says
there’s no way he could
personally visit all the farms
he buys from, let alone learn
enough about the farms to
evaluate the environmental
and social conditions on the
ground.
“We import from 26
countries,” he says. “In
northern Peru, I’d have to
spend 60 hours behind the
wheel of a car on really bad
roads just to visit our farms.
That doesn’t include any
processing facilities in the
area. And that’s just one
region.” To Wirth, direct-trade
relationships must include
personal farm visits and a
fairly thorough understanding
of the farm’s day-to-day
operations.
Importers such as Cooperative Coffees, Café Imports and Atlas
Coffee Importers all support roasters’ direct-trade relationships
to different degrees. Sometimes they help facilitate relationships
between roasters and farmers, other times they assist with qualityimprovement
projects, and sometimes they simply help the farmer
efficiently move the coffee after it leaves the farm (all these tasks are
generally defined in the roaster/importer contract).
But even with importer support, it’s a major logistical
undertaking. “I think some people are treating direct trade like
they did fair trade 10 or 11 years ago—like this is the answer,” says
Chapdelaine. “But It doesn’t happen until after a period of time and
a certain volume of coffee,” he says. “My recommendation is always
to put the energy into the relationship and then find good partners
to help with milling, exporting and importing to keep the high-end
products moving.”
In addition, Liu points out that direct-trade and certified coffees
aren’t mutually exclusive. “You can do direct trade with fair trade,
Rainforest Alliance, and organic coffees, too,” he says.
Moving Forward
The major coffee certifiers aren’t just waiting to see how the
market shakes out. Several are working on new initiatives to help
farmers streamline the certification process or improve their process
potential. In the interim, they’re highlighting the non-price
premiums of certifications.
Stacy Geagan Wagner, the director of media and public
relations for Fair Trade USA, says fair trade’s value extends far
beyond a guaranteed floor price. “Fair trade has always been about
giving farmers a voice in the process,” she says, citing the co-ops’
democratic structures and transparency mechanisms. “Every
member votes on what their communities need most to break the
cycle of poverty, whether it’s improving education, health care, or
productive capacity.”
She says market access is another huge benefit, as Fair Trade USA
provides once-marginalized small farmers with market information
far beyond what they’d otherwise receive. The organization plans
to bring more than 200 fair-trade farmers to the 2011 SCAA show to
meet potential buyers.
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The Certification Conundrum (continued)
At the same time, Geagan Wagner is up front
about many of the challenges Fair Trade USA
faces. The coyote issue and supply constraints
are big impediments, she agrees. “We really
have to keep talking with farmers about shortterm
versus long-term benefits,” she continues,
noting that the certifying agency is bringing in
new cooperatives each month. She also says Fair
Trade USA is working closely with domestic and
international lenders to expand farmers’ access to
pre-harvest credit. “That’s so important.”
Most intriguingly, Geagan Wagner says
Fair Trade USA is open to doing some things
differently than it has in the past. She says the
organization is becoming more active in quality
improvement, having worked with USAID
and a couple of large coffee companies to open
cupping labs and provide agronomy training in
Brazil. Fair Trade USA is even openly discussing
whether to expand its reach beyond cooperatives. “We hear lots of complaints about
non-cooperative farmers not being able to receive fair-trade certification,” she says. “So
we’re asking ourselves, ‘How do we expand fair trade in coffee? Do we look at other farm
settings? Maybe even estate coffees?’”
And Geagan Wagner is forthright about the need for better communication with
roasters and other coffee professionals. “We started as an activist community, but we’re
now development professionals focused on improving the lives of coffee farmers,” she
says. “We don’t want to create impact ourselves, but help the industry create impact.
That means working in partnership with farmers, roasters and other people in the
coffee industry.”
The Rainforest Alliance is in a different position than Fair Trade USA, having
focused initially on certifying sizable coffee estates rather than small farmers and coops.
Sabrina Vigilante, the director of sustainable value chains for the organization,
says it’s difficult for the Rainforest Alliance to work with smallholders because so
many of its standards are based on land use, which requires a defined area and an
organized management strategy. Many smallholders aren’t in a position to manage the
requirements by themselves, and still more are located in remote regions with limited
access to certifiers.
Vigilante says that the organization has been making progress on the smallholder
front for the past several years, however. Small farmers generally need to band into
some form of producer group to receive certification—not necessarily a co-op—and gain
the support of a local entity, such as an exporter or development group. She says the
funding for such projects has grown exponentially, including support from the UN
Development Program.
“It’s a big investment to work with the most disadvantaged farmers,” says
Vigilante. “It doesn’t happen overnight. It’s a huge investment of time, and you’re
working with different cultures
with different sensitivities. It’s a
long process.” Vigilante says the
UN project is providing technical
assistance to farmers through
Rainforest Alliance certification,
with a directive to improve the
social, environmental and economic
condition of smallholders in six
Latin American countries. “That’s
the biggest project we have in coffee
right now, and it’s totally focused on
smallholders,” she says.
“It’s funny how people’s residual impression defines you
in a certain way,” says Vigilante, referring to the Rainforest
Alliance’s reputation as a near-exclusive certifier of large
estates. “Even when you adapt and change, you’re always
characterized in that mold. But that’s OK.”
As with Fair Trade USA, Vigilante says the Rainforest
Alliance is continually updating its standards based on
feedback from producers and other coffee professionals. She
says the organization is also working with Fair Trade USA
and the organic certifiers to strengthen certifications as a
whole. “They’re not all the same, but when they do overlap,
we can learn from one another.”
Vigilante expects at least a moderately bumpy ride while
the Rainforest Alliance adapts to high coffee prices. She anticipates some farmers will
leave the program because the premiums are too low, while others will stay in it through
thick and thin. Vigilante says one advantage of the Rainforest Alliance approach is that
much of its demand is driven by partnerships with major roasters who have committed to
long-term buying relationships. Farmers or estates that leave the program risk sacrificing
these relationships for the immediate rewards of a high market.
Of the various certifications, UTZ Certified may be mixing things up the most.
Founded in 1997 by the Dutch roaster Ahold Coffee Company and its Guatemalan
suppliers, who didn’t qualify for fair-trade certification, UTZ Certified is little known in
the United States. However, the organization is doing some interesting work at origin that
stands to benefit both the specialty coffee industry and other certifiers.
First, UTZ has invested heavily in developing an online traceability system that links
producers with traders and roasters. This “transparent marketplace,” as UTZ General
Manager Graham Mitchell calls it, can trace different stages of quality while also
notifying farmers of the premium others have received for similar coffees. As Mitchell
hypothesizes, “For a Guatemalan SHB screen size 12, farmers could look up the national
average for the coffee at ANACAFE and use that as a benchmark. Or they can look at the
second window on Kenya and see what premiums Kenyan farmers received.” Mitchell
expects the coffee traceability system to launch in the third quarter of 2011.
Second, UTZ works with third-party certifiers rather than acting as a certification
body itself. “We train them on our code of conduct, but they’re basically competing for
the farmers’ work at origin,” says Mitchell. The significance of this from UTZ’s perspective
is that it gives farmers more certification flexibility, as these independent auditors could
potentially combine an organic, UTZ, and even a direct-trade audit into a single farm
visit, saving a farmer both time and money.
This leads into UTZ’s idea for pre-certification. UTZ changed its code of conduct
in 2009 to reward farmers for continuous improvement, requiring them to meet set
milestones over a five-year period. Initially, the farm has to meet a baseline: no child
labor, farmer housing, good land practices, a reliable record-keeping system, etc. As a
farm gradually improves certain practices, UTZ will work with the farm to improve in
other areas as well.
This by itself isn’t a dramatic difference from other certifiers, as most do some
development work at origin; and Rainforest Alliance has a similar philosophy on farms
that show progressive improvement. However, UTZ’s pre-certification work would not be
restricted to UTZ Certified farms. In fact, a farmer could use UTZ’s technical assistance as
a way of pursuing other certifications over time, such as organic, fair trade or Rainforest
Alliance. Most of the funding would not come from the farmers themselves, but from
public and private grants and assistance from coffee roasters.
“We’d like it to act as a foundation,” explains Mitchell. “If a big farm group has one
or two mills that want to be fair trade, we can support them. It they’re more interested in
biodiversity, we could help them receive Rainforest Alliance certification. If they liked our
path as a driver, they’d choose the UTZ certification. We see our practices as agronomycontinued
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®
The Certification Conundrum: Are Coffee Certifications Still Important? (continued)
and business-based, helping farmers set up a good system from a
productivity and training sense.”
Mitchell also envisions roasters using UTZ to help with their
direct-trade initiatives, perhaps using up-front investment from
roasters to help build wet mills or improve post-harvesting practices
on partner farms. Because UTZ works with trained agronomists in
23 origins in addition to a variety of national coffee boards, Mitchell
in some ways considers UTZ more of a producers’ group than a
traditional certifying agency.
“Right now, if you push farmers too hard on certification,
they’re going to leave your program,” says Mitchell. “They really
have to see the value in it in terms of their businesses. One of the
strong points of our program is that we start at a very early stage
with a farm, from topography and variety all the way through
picking and pruning and post-harvest practices. The value we want
to provide farmers is productivity and green quality.”
Tying It All Together
One of the reasons UTZ is strongly focused on working with other
certifications is to avoid stagnation within the coffee industry. “We
see it in other commodities, too, like cocoa,” says Mitchell. “People
had a lot of good intentions over the past 10 years, but they haven’t
really solved a lot of the farmers’ problems.”
“With all of the
climate challenges
and other concerns,
coffee professionals
are really worried
about supply. And I
think that’s going to
force the programs
to work together,”
Mitchell adds.
“You can’t go to the
farmer anymore
with five different
lists of requirements for five different programs. Those days are kind
of numbered.”
To that end, UTZ Certified, the international Fairtrade Labelling
Organization (FLO) and the Rainforest Alliance/Sustainable
Agriculture Network released a joint statement in February 2011. In
the statement, the organizations committed to working together to
make the certifying process simpler and reduce costs for farmers.
They’re also developing tools and materials that make it easier for
farmers to adhere to multiple standards at once.
For his part, Chapdelaine is optimistic that certifications
and direct trade can work together to make a positive difference
for farmers, provided the coffee industry continues to make it a
priority. “Coffee has been most successful
when you’ve had people who are willing
to pay attention and work hard and be as
equitable as possible,” he says. “That’s what
a relationship does. It deals with problems
succinctly and fairly, and looks forward to
advancing the needs of all parties in the
situation.”
As for what will happen to certified
coffees if the high “C” market holds, Liu and
other sources say it’s really up in the air. Liu
doesn’t think consumers have caught up
to the implications of high “C” prices—or
even that high prices exist—so he expects
demand for certified coffees to at least hold
steady.
Supply?
“Good question.”
Rivers Janssen is a freelance writer and
editor based in Portland, Ore. He can be reached at
riversjanssen@gmail.com.
C e rt i f i c at i o n Re s o u r c e s
Demeter
www.demeter-usa.org
Fair Trade USA
www.fairtradeusa.org
Organic
www.ams.usda.gov/AMSv1.0/nop
Rainforest Alliance
www.rainforest-alliance.org
Smithsonian Bird Friendly
www.nationalzoo.si.edu/scbi/migratorybirds
UTZ Certified
www.utzcertified.org
36 roast May | June 2011 37