Coffee awards and competitions

Roast Magazine’s 2008 Roaster of the Year

I’m in the habit of mentioning Roast Magazine‘s annual Roaster of the Year awards, and I’m a bit tardy in posting the 2008 results.

This year, the macro Roaster of the Year goes to Topeka’s PT’s Coffee Company. Over 95% of the 225,000 pounds PT’s roasted last year came from small lots. Thus PT’s is a great source of very special single origin coffees, many of them sourced under their direct trade model, which includes healthy environmental practices.

It’s been awhile since I have had any of PT’s coffees, so in honor of their honor, I placed an order. I was especially keen to try their Finca Kilimanjaro, from one of Aida Batlle’s El Salvador farms. I’m a big fan of her coffee; you can read our reviews of several of her coffees from Counter Culture here. Aida received organic certification on all three of her farms earlier this year (Mauritania, Kilimanjaro, Los Alpes). The Finca Kilimanjaro is grown at 1650 m on the slopes of the Santa Ana volcano under diverse shade. There are 30 ha in coffee.

This coffee recently scored 95 from Coffee Review. PT’s has already sold out of this coffee, so I won’t do a full review. Let me just say this coffee deserved that 95, and is another stellar example of Aida’s commitment to exceptional sustainable coffee. She grows the Kenyan SL28 variety at Finca Kilimanjaro, and it’s wine-like acidity shines through. This coffee is juicy, very floral — it reminded me a lot of the famous Hacienda La Esmeralda — with a truly room-filling aroma. It was easily one of best coffees I’ve had all year, and had we been doing a review, I would have given it 4.25 motmots.

Moving on, Roast’s micro Roaster of the Year is Coffee Klatch of California, whose coffees are frequently high scorers at Coffee Review. Even roasting less than 100,000 pounds a year and with only four employees, owner Mike Perry still makes several trips to origin a year. He also pursues a direct trade model, and in fact often travels and buys lots with PT’s Jeff Taylor. About a third of Coffee Klatch’s coffees are direct trade, but they also carry Fair Trade selections, as well as a variety of organic coffees. They note that a few of their organics such as the Peru and Mexico are “also shade grown and therefore considered ‘Bird Friendly.'” However, there is no mention of the Smithsonian Migratory Bird Center (the certifier that trademarks “Bird Friendly” coffee) and not enough information in the item descriptions for me to figure out if these are SMBC-certified farms.

Here are my posts on the 2005, 2006, and 2007 winners.

Research on coffee growing

Research: Shade coffee provides additional income besides the coffee crop

Agricultural intensification within agroforestry: the case of coffee and wood products. 2008. Rice, R. A. Agriculture, Ecosystems, and Environment 128:212-218. doi:10.1016/j.agee.2008.06.007

Robert Rice, of the Smithsonian Migratory Bird Center, surveyed 338 owners of coffee farmers in Peru and Guatemala to determine what portion of total income from shaded coffee farms was attributable to non-coffee products derived from the farm. These were smallholders (under 3 ha of coffee; average total farm area was 10 ha in Peru and 6.2 ha in Guatemala). The value of the non-coffee products was based on local market prices, and included the value of products both used/consumed by the farmers, and exchanged or sold.

A fifth to a third of the total value came from non-coffee products. Fruit and fuelwood were the two biggest non-coffee income producers in both countries; lumber for construction materials was also important. Because yields and prices are higher for coffee in Guatemala, the percentage of income derived from non-coffee products was lower there, just under 19%. In Peru, it was 28%.

This is one of the first studies to quantify the “shadow economy” in shade coffee agrosystems that exists alongside of the economics of the coffee production itself. Diversification is particularly important for farmers producing a crop such as coffee, which is so sensitive to global price flucuations. Hopefully, we are also working toward proper appraisal of the value of carbon sequestration and biodiversity preservation in shade coffee systems. When mechanisms are in place to compensate farmers for these less-tangible assets, it should provide further motivation for farmers to foster diverse shade in their coffee holdings.

Forest photo by Alexander Gonzelez.

Certifications

Discontent with certifications

In my post about the Coffee Conference, I noted that one of the most interesting things I came away with was the general displeasure many participants had with coffee certifications. Both Rainforest Alliance and TransFair USA (the Fair Trade certifiying organization in the US) had representatives at the conference. RA’s Bethany Koch (Client Relations Manager) and TransFair’s Kim Moore (Director of Business Development, Coffee and Beverages) both gave presentations that provided current statistics on the amount of coffee certified by each agency, and their various partners.

Participants had several bones of contention.

  • Conflict between the mission of the organizations and their corporate partners. Specifically mentioned were RA’s partnership with Chiquita bananas and Kraft, and both organizations with Walmart. These companies have had very checkered pasts (or presents) and their histories and behavior struck people as highly at odds with the principles behind these certifications. Several people were strident about the hypocrisy of purporting to help small farmers considering Chiquita’s role in destroying the Caribbean banana farming industry. I thought one questioner’s hair was going to catch fire. Likewise, Walmart has faced a lot of criticism about unfair treatment of it’s own workers. Moore’s response regarding Walmart was that Fair Trade is concerned with the producers, not the retailers. Further, he said that all big companies had some dark holes in their pasts, and in essence that TransFair/Fair Trade wanted to look forward and not back. Likewise, people were disturbed by the fact that large roasters such as Kraft can use only 30% Rainforest Alliance certified beans and still put the RA seal on the bag (albeit with a disclaimer). Koch replied with the answer that I have received before from RA. First, that there isn’t enough supply to satisfy the huge demand of  large roasters. However, minutes prior she showed a graph indicating supply was larger than demand, a gap RA strove to maintain so that there would always be enough certified beans. I can only surmise that there isn’t enough supply that matches Kraft’s “flavor” profile. And second, although the volume of certified beans purchased by Kraft (20,000 metric tons in 2007) is a small fraction of their total purchases, RA believes that this makes a huge difference on the ground, and that changing the way a large and influential coffee company does business is a big step in the right direction. This “30% rule” is worthy of a post all of its own. Suffice to say that overall, people did not seem satisfied with these responses.
  • Fair Trade prices are too low. The Fair Trade floor price was recently raised to a modest $1.25/lb (there is also a $0.10 social premium that does not necessarily go to the farmer), only $0.11 higher than when it was established in 1988. Producers at the conference noted several times that it was not adequate to compensate for the rising cost of production. This same conclusion was drawn by Daniel Jaffee in his excellent book Brewing Justice: Fair Trade Coffee, Sustainability, and Survival.
  • Exclusionary policies of Fair Trade. Fair Trade certification is only available to cooperatives, not to individual small farmers or larger plantations (and therefore does not protect temporary workers at these locations). Further, Moore revealed that even many cooperatives do not qualify for Fair Trade certification. A representative of the PEARL project questioned the wisdom of small cooperatives in Rwanda participating in Fair Trade since the cost of the certification itself was a large percentage of revenues for these producers which still had low outputs. Moore’s answer was direct and honest, but made more than a few people squirm. He noted that co-ops needed to be commercially viable entities in order to qualify for certification. He said that Fair Trade is not a beginning intervention point and “Fair Trade is not for the very most in-need farmers.”

Geoff Watts pointed out that Fair Trade uses promotional language that “glorifies” cooperatives and implies that private sector efforts are evil. I’ll add that this applies to other certifications, which often urge buyers to only buy certified coffee (whatever seal is being promoted) as the only ethical choice. Watts said this leads consumers who want to do the right thing away from choices that might do the most good (e.g., Direct Trade initiatives). Indeed, in private conversations I had with some of the small retail roasters in attendance, all told me that they have had customers in their shops who demand coffee with a Fair Trade seal and didn’t even want to hear about directly-sourced coffees from farms that had been paid more than the Fair Trade price. As Jaffee asks in his book,

“What good will it do to have Nestlé displaying the fair-trade seal on a tiny portion of its coffee if the company ultimately succeeds in confusing consumers and undermining their confidence in the integrity of fair trade overall”?

As evidenced by opinions expressed at this conference, the integrity of these seals has already been diluted or compromised. Their success depends not only on the support of consumers, but also roasters and retailers. TransFair and Rainforest Alliance need to examine adopting some sort of tiered certification system that differentiates between products that are truly 100% certified, and those that are part of a limited effort. Brands which use only small portions of certified beans should be required to increase by a set percent over a specified time period, and all these actions should be transparent to the public.

Further, I believe that large corporations (the big roasters) should bear the burden of the costs of certifying the producers. These costs — initially $2000 to $4000 plus regular inspections — prevent many producers from ever getting certified in the first place, locking them out of these markets. The multinationals can well afford to cover these expenses. This will also have the added benefit of acting as an investment by these corporations in their suppliers, providing, one hopes, some long-term stability. I’d also like to see some sort of additional fee paid by these large companies, for as long as their certified supply remains under a particular level, that would help subsidize the fees of other farmers.

Socially and environmentally responsible seals have worthy standards and great missions, but their success depends on goodwill and trust. What I found intriguing was that this was a left-leaning crowd, the type that typically supports, and even helped found, these certification movements. It’s a shame to see this trust eroding.

Blends/Multiple / Coffee reviews

Coffee review: Counter Culture Coffee Finca Nueva Armenia

Plainspoken Coffee. A Coffee Review for Ordinary People by Ordinary People, #39.

We did a quick take on Counter Culture’s Finca Nueva Armenia a couple of years ago, as it was used in their Sanctuary shade-grown coffee line. We liked it then, we like it now.

This certified organic selection from the Huehuetenango region in Guatemala is now one of Counter Culture Direct Trade Certified coffees. FNA was founded in the late 1800s. The current owners, the Recinos family, have had it since the 1940s and are now in the fourth generation of coffee farming. The farm went organic in the 1990s — one of the first organic farms in the country.

Coffee grows under multi-tiered shade with 50 species of shade trees recorded on the farm. The farm was very recently qualified for Smithsonian Bird-Friendly status. This is significant, as the farm is quite large — 113 ha. FNA grows mostly bourbon and typica varieties, at 1500 to 1833 m (click on this map for a satellite image).

As a family-owned farm, Finca Neuva Armenia doesn’t qualify for Fair Trade certification, which only covers small farmers that are part of a cooperative. But the Recinos family pays their workers 30% more than surrounding farms during the harvest, including even better rates at the end of the harvest when the per-person picking yield drops, in order to encourage picking for quality as opposed to quantity. And the Counter Culture Direct Trade program pays farmers well above Fair Trade prices.

On the package, this is described as a “classic breakfast coffee. It is certainly that — very well-balanced, light-bodied, the last drop tasting as good as the first without turning bitter in the cup. It was gently sweet, with milk chocolate tones and a short finish. But it is what I like to call a “classic ++”, as there were just these hints of other flavors that made it stand out from the typical classic Central American profile. For several tasters, there was an apple or apricot aspect. One person thought it was “spicy”, but another put his finger tongue on it with “cinnamon”. For me there was also a spicy/savory aroma and flavor, especially when the coffee was prepared as a pour-over or French press, that I really liked. I found myself chasing after that taste in sip after sip. I was never able to describe it more specifically, but sure enjoyed trying! It averaged out at 3.75 motmots; my score is just over 4 motmots.

If you are looking for a really great quality, super-tasting, affordable coffee that is farmed under the most stringent environmental criteria — this is it!