United Farm Workers, the iconic farmworker union started by César Chávez during the 1960s, may be most closely associated with California, but it has been working in the coffeelands since 2012. . . Erik Nicholson, a national Vice President at UFW, has been leading the charge. He has been working tirelessly for farmworker justice for […]
Last week, we celebrated International Coffee Day by announcing a $4.5 million commitment to establish the CRS Coffeelands Program, a global effort to pursue our vision for the future of the coffee sector: smallholder coffee growers who are organized, profitable and resilient; coffee farmworkers who are dignified, engaged and empowered; and coffee-growing landscapes that build […]
Back in July, the International Coffee Organization announced that 1 October would be International Coffee Day. Ever since, it has been asking this question on its social media: “How are you celebrating International Coffee Day?” Today, I am delighted to answer on behalf of CRS: by launching a global coffee program. . .
Tomorrow marks the first-ever International Coffee Day. The International Coffee Organization (ICO) calls it “an opportunity for coffee lovers to share their love of the beverage and support the millions of farmers whose livelihoods depend on the aromatic crop.” To mark the occasion, the ICO has launched a campaign with the international humanitarian organization Oxfam […]
In this post yesterday, I mentioned the Business Supply Chain Transparency on Trafficking and Slavery Act of 2015, a bill currently in committee in both houses of Congress. The proposed legislation includes detailed requirements on what and how U.S. companies with more than $100 million in annual sales revenues would be required to publicly disclose […]
As I was starting graduate school back in the year 2000, my wife and I bought a used Subaru Outback. Once we did, we couldn’t help but notice how many there were on the road. They seemed to be everywhere. Our purchase did not, of course, expand the universe of Outbacks or coincide with an […]
In this post more than two years ago, I juxtaposed Colombia’s long-standing and very deliberate efforts to eradicate coca with the more recent policies of the country’s coffee institutions, which I suggested may be contributing unintentionally to the eradication of the traditional coffee varieties that made Colombian coffee famous. The post was inspired by my […]
Over the past two years, we have been working with colleagues in the coffee and nonprofit sectors to better understand farmworker issues in the coffeelands. In the process, we have boosted our farmworker IQ and busted some commonly held myths about farm labor in the coffee sector, like this one: MYTH: Farm labor is only […]
The text of the 2008 U.S. Farm Bill is more than 600 pages long. Buried somewhere near the middle, under “Subtitle C–Miscellaneous,” is section 3205, which calls for the creation of a Consultative Group to Eliminate the Use of Child Labor and Forced Labor in Imported Agricultural Products. Its mandate? Recommend actions companies can take […]
Jennifer Medina is a national correspondent for The New York Times based in Los Angeles. A little over a week ago, she published an analysis of recent minimum wage legislation in the United States titled “Higher Wages, Great! But How to Enforce?” Today I take license with her title, take issue with her analysis, and […]
