Response to the Seattle Times article, "How Fair is Fair Trade Coffee".

by Sabrina Vigilante

Hello Friends,

The coffee farm highlighted in the lead of the Seattle Times article was certified by the Rainforest Alliance and its SAN partners. We published a short piece (below) on the farm last month for our e-newsletter, Rainforest Matters. Thought you'd be interested in learning more about this amazing farm.

In response to Meacham's article, Carolee Colter, of Seattle Audubon's Northwest Shade Coffee Campaign writes:

"It is frustrating that the media make the story into something negative--"this plantation is denied the right to be certified as Fair-Trade"--when there is really something positive---"this plantation that has been certified under the Eco-OK seal because it meets strict social and environmental criteria." For years the shade coffee movement had the same problem. The media saw the story as "Your coffee is killing songbirds" when we saw the story as "Your choice of coffee can help save songbirds."

Selva Negra, the Black Forest of Nicaragua

Selva Negra, a farm enrolled in the Rainforest Alliance's sustainable agriculture program, is one of the most diversified in all of Central America. One half of the heavenly landscape is maintained as untouched primary forest, providing habitat for puma, sloth, ocelot, anteaters, wild boar, peccaries, howler monkeys and more. Three hundred acres are devoted to shaded coffee, all of which is dried in the sun, rather than using energy intensive industrial dryers. Mausi and Eddy Kuhl, the farm's owners, were the very first to use an innovative technology that produces methane from coffee waste (mucilage and pulp). The clean-burning methane can then be used for cooking. The Kuhl's have devoted another 100 acres to horticulture - vegetables, flowers, livestock and dairy (including a cheese processing facility).

Selva Negra employs 180 permanent workers and an average of 400 temporary workers and the Kuhl's manage their own exporting company. They also cater to eco-tourists, providing 23 bungalows, a youth hostel, chapel and a restaurant.

In order to meet the Rainforest Alliance's rigorous standards for certification, Selva Negra has built chimneys to ventilate worker housing and has discontinued its use of all agrochemicals. The farm spends about $6 per quintal (that's about 45 lbs of unroasted coffee) on social benefits for the farm workers. They include an on-site school that employs two teachers, for grades kindergarten - 5. The children receive free milk, and workers are given three meals per day. Everybody has access to a 24-hour health clinic, and all worker homes have electricity. A fishing pond on the property allows workers to supplement their family's diets with a fresh catch whenever they would like.

Learn more about the sustainable coffee project and support Selva Negra and other progressive farms by purchasing Rainforest Alliance-certified products: ra.org/programs/cap/program-description3.html

Visit Selva Negra

Best regards,

Sabrina Vigilante
Sustainable Agriculture Division
Rainforest Alliance
665 Broadway, Suite 500
New York, New York 10012
Tel: (212)677-1900 ext 1973
www.rainforest-alliance.org