What is “Fair Trade” and what is “Fairly Traded” and what do they mean to you and I and the coffee producers?
Red Whale Coffee Company is Fair Trade Certified. But we feel more importantly the issue here is that we buy specialty grade and “Fairly Traded” coffees. What does “Specialty Grade Coffee” and “Fairly Traded” mean? It means that the growers that grow the “Specialty Grade” coffee assure that the coffee meets a certain quality standard set forth by SCAA. Now since the growers that we buy from grow a specialty high-grade product, we pay a premium for that coffee and the grower directly benefits. What does this higher payment equate too? It means that the grower is being paid a premium typically much higher than what he or she would get from being “Fair Trade” and without the third party agency (Trans Fair) looking over there shoulder and telling these communities how to live there lives. Yes there are pros and cons to both of these, but is “Fairly Traded” more important? In our eyes yes, absolutely!
This year 2007 Red Whale Coffee Company signed an agreement with Ethiopia to license their coffee and the names of their coffees (Long Berry Harrar, Yirgacheffe, Sidamo). This agreement is the same one that Starbucks has been avoiding and fighting against. Heaven forbid that the people become smart and stand up to the big boys. What the growers of Ethiopia have done by putting forth this initiative is take control of their own destiny without much outside dictatorship from third parties. We feel that this is very important for third world countries to stand up and take notice of Ethiopias efforts.
Ethiopians that grow coffee and are part of this initiative can now say we the growers will not stand or take the controlled market prices that NYBOT trades their coffee for. Ethiopian growers can now have a better chance to make money for their fruits of labor and reinvest in their families and communities. In the past companies like Starbucks have been paying bellow what it actually costs to these growers to produce the high quality Ethiopian coffees. Starbucks makes huge amounts of profit from coffee and the labor of the growers. By not paying the growers a “Fairly Traded” price these growers cannot get ahead. In many circumstances the growers are pulling their crops in light of less labor-intensive crops that make them more money. If you think about the communities and the growers that produce these coffee’s you drink and enjoy every day, if they cannot reinvest in their families and communities why should they produce this product for you?
Community, Family, Self-sustainability, Fairly Traded products, organics and ultimately knowledge are extremely important for all of our futures.
Red Whale Coffee is dedicated to help in any way we can. We firmly believe in programs like the Ethiopian initiative and will support these types of grass roots efforts. If we support high quality produced products than the producers should recieve top dollar (not the middle men).
Sean Boyd
Red Whale Coffee Company