By Michael J. Johnson
Michaelyn Bachhuber, director of Catholic Relief Services’ (CRS) CAFÉ Livelihoods (Coffee Assistance For Enhanced Livelihoods) spoke about Fair Trade coffee to a small group gathered at the Sentient Bean coffee house in Savannah on April 14. Prior to the public presentation at the Sentient Bean, Bachhuber chatted with the Southern Cross about CAFÉ Livelihoods and Fair Trade issues.

Globally Fair Trade seeks to overcome trade practices that are exploitive of small isolated producers of coffee, chocolate, spices and crafts. When asked about the Fair Trade initiative Bachhuber said “Fair Trade has done a phenomenal job at creating alternative marketing strategies.”

A CRS news brief states “The three-year project (CAFÉ Livelihoods) targets 7,100 family farms in Mexico, Guatemala, El Salvador and Nicaragua by improving the quality of their coffee and linking them to a growing specialty coffee market in the U.S. and Europe. Through the project—a unique partnership between CRS and coffee-industry allies—farmers receive technical assistance in everything from coffee production and post-harvest processing to financial management.”

Bachhuber was accompanied by Simone Blanchard, program officer of CRS’ Southeast Regional Office. At the start of the public presentation, Blanchard asked seven volunteers to take the stage and represent the “players” in the traditional path from farmer to consumer. Fair Trade links farmers to a single consolidated partner allowing more of the profit to go directly to the coffee growers and their communities.

Small scale individual farmers do not have as much bargaining power as do the cooperatives organized with Fair Trade participation. Not only is there increased bargaining power within the cooperatives, but CAFÉ Livelihoods provides training and certification to increase the yields and quality of the coffee brought to market. The farms are small scale family farms and the owners, conditions permitting, raise basic grains for sustenance. Coffee is their only cash crop.

A cycle of poverty has developed in which low yield coffee trees and poor product quality lead to low market prices that in turn cause workers to leave the farms and sell their labor else where. Lacking labor the land is neglected and the problem only worsens. In addition, workers are absent from their families and communities.

Purchasing Fair Trade coffee places consumers in solidarity with the farmers. “The goal,” Bachhuber said, “is to educate consumers on this end of the coffee chain and not make a big guilt trip out of it.”

She continued, “We must develop a realistic understanding and not just romanticize Fair Trade. There are still many problems.”

“I consider all this to be a great big experiment,” she said, “and sometimes we are going to fall flat on our faces . . . But, we have to be willing to get out there and try things to deal with very serious problems on this planet.”

Note: Bachhuber started her career in international development in 1990, as a United States Peace Corps volunteer in Guatemala, where she trained subsistence farmers in nursery establishment, soil conversation techniques, reforestation practices and organic vegetable production. Upon returning to the United States, she cofounded a 10-acre organic farm in Washington, which sold produce to co-ops, farmers markets, CSA members and area restaurants.

Bachhuber holds a master’s degree in intercultural and international management from the School of International Training in Vermont and a bachelor’s degree in Latin American studies and Spanish from Marquette University. She is a Donella Meadows Leadership Fellow, a program of the Vermont’s Sustainability Institute. The two-year fellowship is designed to train leaders in the application of systems theory to issues of sustainability.

(Source CRS)