Category: Markets

How can we encourage direct investment at the base of the coffee supply chain?

2015-06-08 Kraig Kraft Comments Off

Hugh and I are in the Netherlands, where we are getting ready to participate in the Sustainable Food Lab Summit, a meeting that gathers together different stakeholders in supply chains and facilitates a great discussion about finding solutions to ensure the future of our global supply chains. It is against this backdrop that I start […]

Microlots: More questions from “Alex”

2015-06-03 Coffeelands Staff Comments Off

This is the second in a two-part conversation with my friend “Alex,” a respected colleague in coffee, that explores the opportunities, limitations and impacts of microlots. Read the first part here.

Microlots: Questions from “Alex”

2015-06-02 Coffeelands Staff Comments Off

I have a friend in coffee whom I am going to call “Alex.” S/he is brilliant. Driven. Focused. Working hard to make coffee sourcing at her/his company more profitable for people in its supply chain and less damaging to the planet. Alex and I have had an ongoing conversation over the past few years about […]

Bird Friendly Coffee: Good for the farmers?

2015-05-22 Jefferson Shriver Comments Off

Dr. Robert Rice is commonly referred to as the coffee industry’s “voice of the birds,” and the certification he represents the gold standard for environmentally friendly coffee. That point is difficult to argue: The Smithsonian’s Migratory Bird Center’s Bird Friendly coffee certification requires farmers to be organic certified, possess at least ten different species of trees […]

A (coffee-focused) David Letterman mash-up

2015-05-20 Coffeelands Staff Comments Off

Tonight is the last broadcast of the Late Show with David Letterman. In homage to his 33 years on the air, I offer this coffee-focused mash-up of the venerable “Top 10 List” and the comparatively lesser-known sketch “Is this anything?” The first needs no introduction; the second featured oddball performances by guests, then banter between […]

The FNC reacts to recommendations for reform

2015-05-19 Coffeelands Staff Comments Off

In 2013, Colombia was roiled by a series of strikes that started in the coffeelands but soon went national. The coffee growers who catalyzed the wave of protests called for immediate price supports and reforms to the country’s coffee institutions. President Juan Manuel Santos granted the former and, with respect to the latter, convened a […]

Costs of production: Field data from Colombia

2015-05-12 Coffeelands Staff Comments Off

At The SCAA Event last month, our CIAT friend and colleague Mark Lundy presented the results of costs-of-production research we did together on the basis of 2013 data from our Borderlands Coffee Project in Colombia. Today I explore with Mark what we learned from those data and what implications they may have for coffee buyers […]

4 Perspectives on the Colombia Sensory Trial

2015-05-06 Coffeelands Staff Comments Off

I have been writing here about the Colombia Sensory Trial for more than a year. With presentations of the findings coming up at Re:co Symposium in Sweden and the Nordic Roaster Forum in Denmark, there will certainly be more to say in the coming months. For now, however, I will let this topic rest, leaving […]

SCAA Symposium video: “A Simple Question”

2015-04-29 Coffeelands Staff Comments Off

Yesterday SCAA Symposium organizers posted a video of my presentation “A Simple Question: Castillo or Caturra?” Watch it in its entirety here. .

Sustainability in practice

2015-04-28 Coffeelands Staff Comments Off

Earlier this month I was scheduled to faciltate a panel during the The SCAA Event titled “Sustainability in Practice”–a conversation with five women who are among the best thinkers (and doers) on sustainability issues in specialty coffee: Sarah Beaubien Vice President of Sustainability FARMER BROTHERS COFFEE Tracy Ging Vice President of Sustainability and Special Initiatives […]