The following article, written by Patty Kupfer, was printed in the September/October 2008 issue of Sojourner’s Magazine. Patty used to work for Witness for Peace and co-organized some of Equal Exchange’s Interfaith Department’s delegation visits to Chiapas. During these trips, we visited our coffee farmer partners, CIRSA, an amazing organization of Tzotzil and Tzeltal -speaking indigenous farmers located in the highlands of Chiapas. Patty interviewed some members of the co-op for this article. You can also read more about CIRSA in the Viroqua Food Co-op’s May/June 2008 newsletter.
Ask the nearly 600 members of the CIRSA coffee cooperative in the mountains of Chiapas, Mexico, how things are going and they’ll tell you, “Little by little, we’re moving forward.” Considering that a couple of decades ago the parents of these indigenous farmers worked in slavery-like conditions on large coffee plantations in the region, and that their region has been ignored and marginalized throughout its history, their progress is tremendous.
The Indigenous Communities of the Simojovel de Allende Region (CIRSA in Spanish) shipped 235 tons of fair trade coffee last year to the United States and Europe. Through the fair trade certification system, the small farmers of CIRSA and similar cooperatives throughout Latin America are guaranteed a minimum price for their coffee. This provides stability to small farmers, who live in some of the world’s poorest regions—and who are especially vulnerable to the volatile market that dictates world coffee prices. This is why, on our weekly trip to the grocery store, many of us fork over some extra change for fair trade coffee.
Twenty years after its birth, the fair trade movement is suffering some growing pains. No longer a fringe movement, fair trade boasted $2.2 billion dollars in global sales during 2006, and debates rage from within about whether rapid expansion may be compromising the movement’s core principles.
One key debate focuses on the difference between small farmer cooperatives and large plantations. Right now, plantations can’t participate in the fair trade coffee market, but recent proposals would change that. In products such as tea and bananas, most fair trade items already come from large plantations, which win certification by ensuring higher wages, increased worker protections and greater social investments than they would otherwise provide. So what’s the problem with plantations?
It’s important to see how fair trade certification fits into the bigger picture of farmers’ struggle for a decent livelihood. Take the example of CIRSA: The coffee farmers of Simojovel de Allende struggled for years to win the land reform that enabled them to become independent smallholders. The plantations where their families had worked were a legacy of the colonial era, when a small elite controlled most political and economic structures, allowing them to sustain miserable working conditions with miniscule chances for upward mobility.
Owning their own land gave the CIRSA farmers the footing to organize as a cooperative in 1992; the higher wage they earn from fair trade certified coffee, in turn, helps them to win the constant struggle to stay organized.
CIRSA’s treasurer, Juan López, states it eloquently: “Alone, you can’t do anything. We’ve joined together to make a better life.” Phyllis Robinson, education and campaigns manager at fair trade vendor Equal Ex-change, agrees that getting organized is critical. “Small farmers in today’s agricultural markets are up against all odds. The higher, more stable price of fair trade helps keep farmers organized in co-ops, where they have an easier time accessing credit or technical capacity building.”
If the Fair Trade Labeling Organization (FLO) were to start certifying coffee plantations—an idea that has been defeated for now, but is sure to rise again—chains like Wal-Mart or Starbucks would likely make their fair trade purchases from the largest producers, to simplify their logistics. Small farmers worry this shift would take them down a slippery slope back to the dominance of the plantation model.
Another concern is whether fair trade is still providing a living wage. In 2007, FLO approved the first increase of its minimum coffee price in 18 years. The increase of five cents per pound of coffee brought the total price to $1.31 (the price for organic fair trade coffee went from $1.41 to $1.51 a pound). While higher market prices in recent years have forced fair trade buyers to pay above the minimum to guarantee their supplies, farmers pointed to increases in labor and transportation costs that still weren’t covered.
Despite the challenges, CIRSA is committed and hopeful about its future in fair trade. Last year the co-op met all its sales goals and had a surplus to sell to the Mexican market. They’ve purchased their own semitrailer for transport. Every year they pick up a dozen or so new members.
In 2004, CIRSA began receiving visits from groups of U.S. consumers. They welcomed the chance to deepen the commitment and awareness between coffee drinkers and producers, recognizing the importance of an international network of consumers who are paying attention. As Robinson points out, fair trade works best not as an end in itself, but as “a window to get you hooked in. It’s not the last thing you do.”
Patty Kupfer worked in Mexico from 2003 to 2005 as an international team member for Witness for Peace. Currently, she organizes for immigration reform.
Small Farmers. Big Change. 
It was energizing to read Ms. Kupfer’s article this morning especially in light of continued uninformed attacks from proselytizing navel gazers who condemn all things fair trade as unsustainable and ultimately bad for coffee farmers. The article brought me back to Chiapas where a group of us were fortunate to visit in January this year, spending time with the CIRSA people and in the mountains with a large family, from the coop, in their community of “February 11th”; named for the day they moved there and started to farm the rugged, steep slopes in 1996. What brought me back to Chiapas in Ms. Kupfer’s article were the images of work and hope. These generous, welcoming, people work tirelessly and hope that people, like us, will pay a fair price for the wonderful products they grow—so they can provide a better, healthier life for their families. It’s not that complicated. As we were preparing to leave, Don Pascual shared these parting words: “We’re very happy to have you. Each time you come we get to know each other a little better. You saw how the tree grows and how we process and can understand the work and how it takes a long time. The money barely covers the work. It’s like raising a child.” Indeed.
I have been lucky to travel to visit these very farmers Patty talks about in this article and was on one of the trips that she helped to coordinate. I can’t express how important it is to keep Fair Trade focused on small-scale farmer cooperatives. Most of the current cooperatives are not able to sell all of their coffee on the Fair Trade market due to lack of consumer demand and allowing plantations into the certification system will just make this more difficult.
The real problem with the plantation model, in my view, is the inherent difference of the balance of power. Small-scale farmers are the folks who get exploited from all sides because they lack political and financial power on their own. When they band together with neighboring farmers and build (with much blood, sweat and faith) a successful cooperative they gain more power for themselves, their community and others like them. This forces those that would exploit them to listen to their voices and take them seriously in the business and political arena.
When someone is a worker on a plantation, albeit a well paid and well treated one, their job depends on the landowner and his or her generosity. When there is a history of indigenous and peasant oppression who among us would be brave enough to voice a grievance when there are ready and willing replacements who won’t rock the boat? I’m not saying that every plantation owner would retaliate, but the power dynamic is not equal and is not one that creates the change for the most disadvantaged to be heard.
I fully support the idea of fairly paid and treated workers on plantations and in factories and I hope that one day it is the rule and not the exception. But is this Fair Trade? Does it really create an alternative to the current trade system? I don’t think so.
Even slave owners who treated their slaves well, were wrong to own slaves. Let us not continue the colonial system with corporations as the new royalty but work towards a fair and democratic economy with the benefits distributed to the many.
I visited CIRSA on an Equal Exchange staff delegation to Chiapas, Mexico in January, 2008. Studying the social movements in Chiapas and my visit there has greatly affected my view of social change and movement philosophy.
Some of the memories that come to mind:
1) Driving up the beautiful yet dangerous switch back roads into the highlands and passing the Zapatista community of Oventic, then seeing that there was a heavily foritfied military base just around the next corner. Later we passed a checkpoint of non-uniformed men with shotguns. It provided a first hand view of the low intensity war in Chiapas.
2) Listening to the testimonials of the CIRSA members. These are people who’s grandparents were slaves, not like slaves, but real slaves. They were paid in alchohol or soap if they got anything at all. To realize that these people have pulled themselves up from slavery into owning their own warehouse, fleet of trucks, and operations gave me hope.
3) Hearing testimonials from the Women of CIRSA, who have formed a Mayan style weaving spin-off co-op called OMRISI. One comment that a woman said was, “everyone deserves to live a decent life.”
4) On the overnight stay at a CIRSA coffee farming village playing and interacting with the children. These kids where full of all the same youthful energy of children in our country, but they are lucky enough to live in a place where community and family are emphasized and important. I realized that community values in the US have been taken from us and replaced with a Hollywood, plastic, TV, video game version of reality. These farmers may lack many of the things that we take for granted but they have a sense of togetherness that is rare in my culture. Sitting up late with some of the younger boys was magical. We couldn’t speak each other’s language but we managed to laugh and have fun for a few hours. Plus the stars where amazing.
5) Having the farmers of CIRSA open up their homes to us. I ate the toughest chicken I’ve ever had but it was still great. Before we left they said, “we hope that the food was OK, we’re just simple country folk and don’t have the city food that you are used to”. I almost burst into tears.
6) Hearing the farmers complain that the fair trade price that they where getting still wasn’t enough for them underscored the importance of us working with them as partners and the importance of their membership in CIRSA. Without the cooperative they would be on their own, make even less money and not have any access to the loans that enabled them to build up infastructure (like the all important drying patios) in thier remote village. It made me realize that the fair trade price is such a small part of the equation and that the trade system itself needs to be changed.
7) Seeing a community meeting of about 100 people meet on a Thursday morning. I’ve participated in many activist meetings in the US but have never seen that level of community involvment. It made me realize that activism for them is a way of life, or rather, something that their lives depend on. Here in the States we have a choice between getting involved in politics or not. Down in Chiapas it seems like people don’t have a choice, they must engage.
Hope you enjoyed reading these comments!
-Brian O’Connell
Thanks to everyone for your comments about CIRSA and about the Fair Trade model. CIRSA is one of the co-operatives whose story so clearly highlights the importance of Fair Trade and particularly, the importance of being organized in a small farmer co-operative. At first glance, when visiting Simojovel (and most other areas of the Chiapan highlands), you will still see a lot of poverty. However, as soon as you talk with the farmers, many things become clear: the DIFFERENCE between how they used to live and be treated (when they and their parents and grandparents worked on plantations) compared to today; their sense of pride about being part of a co-operative and what they are now achieving; how the co-operative is THEIRS; how they are making the decisions and INVESTING IN THEMSELVES; their pride that they now have direct, long-term relationships with buyers and that food co-operative representatives are visiting them… These are very powerful emotions that stand along side the higher price and credit and other benefits of Fair Trade that are more easily quantified and discussed.
phyllis