Month: September 2009

Greenwash alert: Nespresso and sustainability

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On September 29, 2009

In Corporate coffee, Nestlé/Nespresso

Several months ago, Nespresso, a division of the giant Swiss multinational food corporation NestlÁ©, announced a major sustainability initiative they are calling Ecolaboration. Nespresso manufactures espresso machines that use proprietary single-use aluminum coffee capsules.

Ecolaboration has three main goals they aim to achieve by 2013:

  1. To reduce its carbon footprint by 20% per cup, primarily by developing “greener” espresso machines.
  2. To increase its capacity to recycle its aluminum capsules to 75% (this does not mean 75% will be recycled, see note 1 below and this post) and to “co-convene an industry roundtable on improving the sustainability performance of the aluminum.”
  3. Source 80% of its coffee from Rainforest Alliance (RA) certified farms (previously, RA was only helping assess farms in their compliance with Nespresso-specific standards, not certifying them; see note 2).

I’m only going to address the coffee sourcing aspect, as sustainably-grown coffee is the focus of this blog.

First, I read Nespresso’s fact sheet on “protecting coffee ecosystems.” A third of the document explains the importance of shade and biodiversity, while the rest neglects to specify any criteria or concrete measures proposed by the company protect the environment.

Thus, the Rainforest Alliance certification criteria will have to act as surrogate for Nespresso’s sustainability efforts. That’s fine, but exactly how much coffee does that “80% certified” represent? Specifically, and importantly, how much as a percent of coffee purchased by parent NestlÁ©, a company famous for its dismal corporate responsibility ratings [3]?

(Updated August 2010 to reflect actual published figures) In 2008, NestlÁ© purchased 780,000 tons of green coffee, similar to previous years and typical of their annual volume [4]. In 2010, Nespresso purchased 490,000 bags (60 kg each) or 29,400 tons under their “AAA Sustainable Quality Program” which includes, but is not exclusively, Rainforest Alliance certified farms [5]. This represents 60% of Nespresso’s purchases, but just under 3.8% of NestlÁ©’s total purchases. Their stated goal is now to source 80% of Nespresso coffee from the AAA program by 2013 (again, not exclusively Rainforest Alliance certified), which would be 5% of NestlÁ©’s total purchases.

The commitment to sustainably-grown, eco-friendly coffee by Nespresso is an extremely small percentage of NestlÁ©’s total purchases. This situation qualifies for what I consider to be the most offensive of the four greenwashing criteria set forth by Greenpeace: Dirty Business. This criteria states “Touting an environmental program or product, while the corporation’s product or core business is inherently polluting or unsustainable.”

I don’t even have to dig any farther into the elaborate hoopla on the Ecolaboration site (which frankly sounds like a rip-off of General Electric’s Ecomagination program). I cannot support such a meager effort, in particular from a company with such a long track record of disregard for labor and human rights, environmental protection, honesty in labeling and marketing, and other unethical business practices.

Notes:

[1] Nespresso offers recycling of the aluminum (home and office type only) capsules in several European countries. Even when Nespresso has expanded recycling efforts, it fails to create any meaningful increase in recycling rates. Due to technical constraints, the capsules themselves are not made from 100% recycled aluminum. This post explains that the whole pod recycling issue is greenwashing.

[2] Nespresso first partnered with Rainforest Alliance (RA) in 2003, and signed a five-year pact in 2006. In the first phase of this partnership (known as the Nespresso AAA Sustainable Quality Coffee Program), RA developed guidelines specifically for Nespresso to improve quality and sustainablity practices on farms supplying Nespresso. These farms were not being certified by RA under their usual criteria. RA appraised the farms to see if they were “implementing better methods and are decreasing their impact on the natural world.” Nespresso must have been happy with the partnership, as they routinely donate tens of thousands of dollars to RA (see annual reports). Under the Ecolaboration project, the goal is for 80% of the coffee to actually come from certified farms meeting RA’s standards. Update 2015: here is a post on the environmental and social requirements for producers in the AAA program. Note the low bar for entrance into the program.

[3] Corporate Watch lists numerous corporate crimes; another laundry list is at Global Investment Watch; Responsible Shopper outlines some boycotts and alerts; Source Watch lists more problems; and Ethical Corporation provides an article skeptical of NestlÁ©’s CSR report. Add it all up, and you get an award for least responsible company in 2005 (nomination here).

[4] Coffee Barometer 2009, linked to and summarized here; Ethical Sourcing – Creating Shared Value, 2008, NestlÁ© (PDF).

[5] NestlÁ© Nespresso Ecolaboration Progress Report, June 2011 (PDF).

Photo by svet under a Creative Commons license.

The water footprint of coffee

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On September 21, 2009

In Coffee and the environment, Research on coffee growing

The water footprint of coffee and tea consumption in the Netherlands. 2007. Chapagain, A.K., and A. Y. Hoekstra. Ecological Economics 64:109-118.

This is not a newly published paper, but I found it well worth summarizing here.

“Footprint” evaluations — ecological, carbon, or water — determine the amount of a resource needed to produce a unit of a good. This paper calculated the water footprints per ton and per cup of tea and coffee, as well as “virtual” water imports into the Netherlands for each beverage. I’ll only summarize the water footprint of coffee here, but the paper can be downloaded from the publications list at the Water Footprint Network.

The authors measured coffee crop water requirements in different parts of the world. Some regions must irrigate (e.g., Brazil) while others rely on rainfall. Water used in processing, which also varies by region, was then factored in. Much of the world’s coffee (especially arabica) is wet processed, requiring a water source such as a river or groundwater to ferment and wash the coffee prior to drying the beans.

The calculations also took into account the shrinking weight of the product throughout processing — e.g., fresh cherries to pulped cherries to hulled beans, etc.– in order to keep the metric (cubic meters of water per ton of coffee) consistent.

Because of all the variability, from annual crop water requirements (they used FAO estimates) to the number of grams of ground or instant coffee used to make a weak or strong cup, this whole operation is somewhat of an inexact science. However, the authors appeared meticulous in their choices and inclusiveness, and the results seem to at least give us a relative picture between regions and methods, if not numbers that are actually well in the ballpark.

As it turns out, there was little difference whether coffee was wet or dry processed. The water used in wet processing made up only 0.34% of water used to grow the coffee. The summary tables provided figures for wet processing only.

The main results summarized the cubic meters of water used per ton of coffee (for each step from fresh cherry to roasted) for 25 countries.  The two countries with the highest totals were both robusta-producing nations: Togo (49341 m3/ton) and Ghana (47554). In fact, six of the top ten countries grew robusta either exclusively or in addition to arabica. The highest arabica-only country was Panama at 37660 m3/ton.

The average (weighted for world production) “virtual water content” was calculated at 20987 m3/ton. Lowest countries were Vietnam at 6054 and the U.S. (Hawaii and Puerto Rico, 9061). Other countries that grow primarily arabica which were ranked below-average were Ethiopia, Guatemala, Costa Rica, El Salvador, Bolivia, and Colombia.

Finally, the authors calculated that the “average” cup of coffee required around 140 liters of water; several variations were provided. The authors also estimated that if the price of coffee included the economic value of rainwater, it would increase about 20 cents per kilo. This cost increase does not include surface or groundwater used for processing or irrigation water, nor any environmental costs due to erosion or water pollution.

Coffee flotation in Chiriqui, Panama; photo by Darrin O’Brien, used with permission.

Chapagain, A., & Hoekstra, A. (2007). The water footprint of coffee and tea consumption in the Netherlands Ecological Economics, 64 (1), 109-118 DOI: 10.1016/j.ecolecon.2007.02.022

Know your coffee birds: Violet Sabrewing

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On September 13, 2009

In Birds and other biodiversity, Know Your Coffee Birds series

One of the most enduring memories of my visit to Finca Hartmann is that of passing a spot that was frequently visited by a vivid male Violet Sabrewing (Campylopterus hemileucurus), a large tropical hummingbird found from southern Mexico to western Panama. Many of us in the U.S., especially in the east, think of hummingbirds as diminutive creatures. Violet Sabrewings, however, are big, spectacular birds the size of sparrows. The males are a brilliant dark violet while the females are largely metallic green. Both sexes have white-tipped outer tail feathers that flash as they hover and flit about. They are unmistakable and not soon forgotten.

Violet Sabrewings are most common at 900-1650 meters, the same elevations at which coffee is grown. These hummingbirds like open forests or edge habitats where they can find an abundance of flowering plants, and are found on most bird lists of shade coffee farms within their range.

Hummingbirds are among the most important pollinators, especially in the tropics. Many tropical plants have co-evolved with their specialized hummingbird pollinators, so that the flower is shaped in such a way that only a hummingbird with a matching bill can pollinate it. Violet Sabrewings pollinate a wide variety of flowers, and utilize a foraging strategy known as long distance traplining. They repeatedly visit flowers along a long, fixed route.

Coffee itself is rarely pollinated by hummingbirds (arabica coffee is self-pollinating, although fruit set increases when bees help cross-pollinate). Therefore, sabrewings and other hummingbirds are rarely found in sun coffee farms, but are reliant on the other flowering trees and plants found in shade coffee. Trees in the genus Erythrina are commonly used to shade coffee, and most tropical species are pollinated only by hummingbirds. Bananas and plantains, also frequently used in shade coffee, heliconias, and various ephiphytes are all very important to Violet Sabrewings and other hummingbirds. This plant diversity is not found in sun coffee, but shade coffee farms provide excellent habitat for these dazzling birds.

Another important feature for Violet Sabrewings found in shade coffee farms is nesting habitat. This species inevitably nests on the branch of a tree or shrub over a small stream (we found several nests near creeks at Finca Esperanza Verde). Some source of running water is characteristic of most coffee farms in Latin America, which use the washed or wet processing method. Without streamside vegetation, it’s unlikely Violet Sabrewings could nest successfully.

Another group of organisms depends on hummingbirds to complete their life cycle. Known as hummingbird mites, these tiny invertebrates live and reproduce in flowers, feeding primarily on the nectar. There is only one way for these specialists to move between plants: in the nostrils of hummingbirds. Mites that need to move to another flower of  their specific host plant (when the flower is dying) must clamber onto the bill and into the nostrils of a hummingbird in the brief few seconds the hummingbird is probing the flower. The mites recognize the scent of their host plants, and have an equally brief time to disembark into a new flower.

Hummingbird mites do not harm the birds; in ecological terms this is known as phoretic commensalism, when one species (the mite) uses another (the hummingbird) just for transportation. The mite benefits, the bird is not affected.

Swaths of sun coffee fragment hummingbird habitat, creating barren deserts essentially void of these beautiful birds, all for the want of a cheap cup of coffee. Save hummingbirds (and hummingbird mites!), drink sustainably-grown shade coffee.

Top photo by Jerry Oldenettel, second by Doug Greenberg, under Creative Commons licenses. Violet Sabrewing nest at Finca Esperanza Verde by Darrin O’Brien and Julie Craves, all rights reserved.

No proof of shade coffee at Dunkin Donuts

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On September 8, 2009

In Corporate coffee, Dunkin Donuts

Recently, Dunkin Donuts Tweeted that the majority of their coffee is shade grown. I’ve been unable to verify this. Dunkin Donuts does not claim to serve or sell shade or sustainably-grown coffee anywhere on their web site. Nor is there any mention of organic coffee.

The only sort of ethical sourcing claimed by Dunkin Donuts is that all espresso-based drinks at Dunkin Donuts stores are made from Fair Trade certified beans. These beverages make up less than 10% (around 5% in 2006) of total global sales. While there is a notion that Fair Trade coffee is often also shade grown, Fair Trade standards have no shade criteria, and their environmental criteria are generic and unquantifiable (see my entire post on this topic). Although much of Fair Trade coffee is also certified organic, that which is purchased by Dunkin Donuts is not (when I searched for the word “organic” on the Dunkin Donuts web site, I got no results at all).

It’s not certified shade or eco-friendly

A spokesperson at the Smithsonian Migratory Bird Center, which certifies Bird-Friendly coffee, told me that Dunkin Donuts approached them a number of years ago but opted not to offer Bird-Friendly certified coffee. Smithsonian reiterated that Dunkin Donuts does not have a contract with them. Rainforest Alliance, excellent at promoting their corporate partners, has no mention of Dunkin Donuts on their web site. The Dunkin packaging does not display the Rainforest Alliance seal that would indicate it contains RA-certified coffee.

Because there is no legal definition of the term “shade grown” coffee, many importers, roasters, and retailers market uncertified coffee as shade-grown to appeal to the eco-conscious consumer, although the consumer has no way of knowing if the claim is true.

Who supplies/roasts Dunkin Donuts coffee?

Brewed coffee in stores and foodservice outlets: Sara Lee. Since 1975, Dunkin Donuts has worked with Sara Lee to supply their franchisees with coffee. According to Sara Lee’s 2005 annual report, they still roasted “much of” Dunkin Donuts coffee. In 2007, Sara Lee partnered with Dunkin’ Donuts, in a multi-year deal, to be the exclusive provider of Dunkin’ Donuts coffee to foodservice outlets across the country.

Retail coffee: Procter & Gamble/Smucker. In 2007, Dunkin Donuts entered into an agreement with Procter & Gamble to roast and distribute Dunkin Donuts coffee in retail outlets. The following year, P&G split off its coffee business, which was taken over by the J. M. Smucker Company. This included the Dunkin Donuts deal, as well as the Folgers and Millstone coffee brands. To the best of my knowledge, Smucker continues to use P&G’s supply chain.

In a comparison of the coffee industry’s largest companies, these roasters received failing grades from Responsible Shopper; you can view their corporate profiles for yourself (Sara Lee, P&G). In 2003, Oxfam America evaluated coffee’s “big four” regarding their efforts to assist struggling coffee farmers; Sara Lee “performed abysmally” while P&G scored 49 out of 100 points. Sara Lee also scored lowest among all food product companies, 13 out of 100, on ClimateCounts.org’s Climate Scorecard.

Where Dunkin Donuts coffee comes from

Dunkin Donuts does not publicly divulge where they source their coffee. The general consensus in the industry, plus information I’ve gleaned, is that their (non-espresso, at least) coffee is mainly sourced from Brazil, Guatemala, and probably Colombia.

Brazil is the world’s largest producers of low-grade arabica coffee, much destined for supermarket blends. Because of its climate, topography, and soil, most of Brazil’s coffee is grown in sun monocultures, mechanically harvested, with high inputs of chemicals, making it difficult to certify as organic or Bird-Friendly (there are no Bird-Friendly certified farms in the country). Although there is a movement towards some producers supplying specialty coffee, the main push in Brazil’s coffee agribusiness is towards increasing technification, due to the lack of land in which to expand to increase production [1].

[Update: Thanks to reader Lesa Gardner for pointing out a 2012 item on Dunkin’s own blog about an employee visit to a Brazilian coffee farm they source from: a vast, full sun plantation, with photo.]

In Colombia, technification of coffee was encouraged beginning in the 1970s by the national coffee growers federation. As of the mid-1990s, about 68% of Colombia’s coffee growing areas were technified (sun) coffee, representing 86% of total production.

Sourcing from Guatemala is perhaps the “best” justification for claiming shade-grown status, as most of Guatemala’s coffee is shade grown. However, a 2001 news article indicated that Dunkin Donuts sourced from the El Pajal/Santa Rosa area. That’s in Alta Verapaz department and considered part of the CobÁ¡n region, which has the lowest altitude, highest rainfall, and highest humidity of any of Guatemala’s eight coffee areas. Coffee grown in wet, cloudy areas like this are rarely grown in the shade. Indeed, a number of biodiversity studies comparing sun coffee and shade coffee used this region because of the presence of large sun coffee plantations and heavily managed shade monocultures [2].

Dunkin Donuts environmental standards

The environment page of the corporate responsibility section of their web site is brief. It notes that in 2008 Dunkin Brands “began to assess the impact of our business on the environment.” They have created an energy efficiency pamphlet for franchisees. There are 8,800 Dunkin Donuts stores in the world; last year they opened one LEED-certified store. It serves coffee in paper cups, whereas most of the company’s 2.7 million cups of coffee served per day are made of polystyrene (“Styrofoam”), which sit in landfills for over 500 years. These cups represent 4% of the total number of polystyrene cups discarded in the U.S. each year.

I’ve tweeted Dunkin Donuts regarding that original statement on Twitter, and I’ve also directly e-mailed the company. So far, I’ve not received a reply. I’ll continue to try to clarify the claim that they use shade coffee. But all the evidence I’ve uncovered so far indicates that they do not use organic or shade-grown coffee, and that Dunkin Donuts has so far not been the kind of environmentally-friendly company I would ever choose to support.

When it comes to supporting the environment, Americans should run from Dunkin.

A final unsavory note: In 2006, Dunkin Donuts was purchased by a consortium of private equity companies: Bain Capital, The Carlyle Group (heavily politically connected and formerly all mixed up in the defense industry), and Thomas H. Lee Partners. Since that time, the company has been suing their franchisees at a brisk pace. An attorney who represents franchise owners said, ”Dunkin has decided that there’s a smarter, more efficient way to increase revenues and that is to find and target franchisees that are vulnerable.” A big chunk of the debt used to finance the purchase of Dunkin Donuts comes due in 2011, and the company is thought to be behind on financial targets needed to extend the debt repayment. If they are feeling a pinch, paying more for sustainably-grown or certified coffee is probably not on their agenda.

[1] Brazilian Agricultural Research Corp. (EMBRAPA) report, 2006 (PDF); Manoel Correa do Lago, Brazilian exporter and economist, pers. comm.

[2] Greenberg, R. and J. Salgado-Ortiz. 1994. Interspecific aggression by Yellow Warblers in a sun coffee plantation. Condor 98:640-642 and Greenberg, R., P. Bichier, A. Cruz-Angon, and R. Reitsma. 1996. Bird populations in shade and sun coffee plantations in central Guatemala. Conservation Biology 11: 448-459.

Dunkin cup photo by the Consumerist, under a Creative Commons License.

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