Challenging times for coffee farmers

By Kate Lewis, Business Development Manager, Fairtrade Foundation

The objective of my recent trip to Peru was both to understand the benefits that Fairtrade has brought to farmers and also to understand the challenges that they face.

The market price of coffee has increased dramatically in the past year and this has created challenges throughout the supply chain. Consumers may not be aware of the increased cost of coffee and rising production costs for farmers. Many suppliers are nervous of raising their retail price despite needing to cover increasing costs. The trip showed me that if we can help consumers understand the real value of coffee and the cost of growing and processing it, a small increase in price is something that would not create the expected negative reaction from coffee lovers here in the UK.

The increase in price has also made it more difficult for co-operatives to buy all their members’ coffee, not just within Fairtrade but within the industry in general.  This is a result of local or private buyers offering them a higher price but with no long-term sustainability or commitment - which they do get when entering into Fairtrade contracts. As a result of this, some co-operatives have not been able to deliver on agreed contracts due to lack of availability of the coffee. We are working with farmers to ensure that they can plan for the future of their business by honouring their long-term contracts, providing training on co-operative management, negotiation and risk management.

Many coffee farmers are starting to see directly the benefits of a better price for their coffee. Through increased revenues and the Fairtrade premium money they are able to improve the quality of their coffee by investing in better processes and improved machinery.  Also, this ability to receive a better income could assist with the current labour issues that coffee farmers face.  At the moment many workers are leaving the industry to work in the cities. If coffee farming can offer a more attractive future, more people have a long term future in the business, so we need more consumers to choose Fairtrade coffee to offer that future to farmers.

Coffee farmers are also facing the negative impact of climate change. In the southern region of Peru in Putina Punco, we met smallholder farmer Luciano Sacaca Ubano. Luciano has been a coffee farmer for 31 years, working on a three hectare farm inherited from his father. The biggest challenge he has faced in recent years is increased rainfall levels which causes the fruit to fall from the tree too early and his affects his ability to dry his coffee beans.  This can reduce his crop from 20 to 15 bags of coffee.  With a family of eight children and only three hectares of land, this reduction in volume has a huge impact on his family’s livelihood.

Climate change is also having other impacts due to general unpredictable weather patterns, for example in the north of Peru the change in weather has created a longer harvest season.  At first the farmers felt that a longer harvest season would be a positive thing but they are struggling to deal with the uncertainty of the weather patterns and it is preventing them to be able to protect and harvest their coffee trees to the best of their ability. The changing weather patterns is going to be an increasingly important concern for coffee farmers and Fairtrade aims to work with producers to fully understand the impact and possible solutions.

The coffee market is facing a challenging time, we are working with all of our partners and producers to ensure that Fairtrade can adapt to changing markets and continue to bring benefits to all those involved.