Down to Earth

How to be environmentally responsible with your coffee choices


Americans consume more coffee than any other nation worldwide. Our collective cups of coffee do have an impact.

Coffee with a fair-trade certified label means the product meets strict international guidelines for fair economic, social and environmental criteria. Fair trade coffee helps hard-working farmers lift themselves out of poverty by giving the farmers the fair market price for their coffee, while requiring sustainable agricultural practices. Otherwise, most small farmers lack market access and often sell their harvest to middlemen for a fraction of its value, keeping them in a cycle of extreme poverty. TransFair USA is the independent organization that monitors fair trade certification in the U.S.

Karisa Centanni, education coordinator for the Honest Weight Food Co-op in Albany, N.Y., traveled to Chiapas, Mexico, to visit a fair trade coffee farm.

"The amount of time, effort, and work that goes into everyday life for these families, to make a VERY modest living, was utterly impressive," Centanni said. "The farmers took their role as protectors of the land very seriously."

Coffee is certified as organic, shade-grown or fair-trade, and some coffee meets more than one criteria. Organic certification means the product has been grown without the use of synthetic pesticides, herbicides and fertilizers on land that has been free of these chemicals for three years. In less-developed countries, where much of the coffee is grown, pesticides banned in the U.S. are still used. Organic certification also protects you from these banned substances. It also protects the farmers from direct exposure to the potentially toxic chemicals and eliminates pollutants that could contaminate waterways, the soil and wildlife. The agency that monitors organic certification is the U.S. Department of Agriculture.

Fortunately, fair-trade and organic certification often go hand in hand. Brian Wenzel, specialty associate team leader at Whole Foods in Bellingham agreed. "Most fair-trade coffee tends to be organic," he said. "At Whole Foods, the fair-trade coffee outsells the more conventional coffee 2-to-1."

Shade-grown coffee is the traditional method of growing coffee plants under a thriving canopy of tropical forests filled with birds and other wildlife. Sadly, shortsighted practices have encouraged farmers to remove the native vegetation to plant more coffee, which has caused severe deforestation and the loss of countless birds and other wildlife.

There is not a national standard for shade-grown coffee. However, two labels have high certification standards: Rainforest Alliance and Smithsonian Migratory Bird Center. Luckily, over 80 percent of the fair-trade coffee sold in the U.S. is also shade-grown.

Certified coffee can be more expensive than the mass-produced coffees, but is competitively priced with the specialty coffees. Most grocery chains offer some brands of certified coffee. To save money, buy certified coffee when it is on sale. Or go halfway, by mixing the certified coffee beans or grounds with the regular coffee and storing it in an airtight jar for your own gourmet brew.

When buying take-out, request organic and/or fair-trade coffee. You might be surprised. In our area, most Dunkin' Donuts, Starbucks and McDonald's offer a choice of certified coffee.

According to numerous studies, by growing a sustainable crop of coffee the environment is protected and farmers are earning a fair wage. Since there is a large overlap of where coffee is grown and areas of rich biodiversity that are threatened, we can help protect those environmental hotspots by drinking a delicious cup of certified coffee. If coffee is not your cup of tea, you can find tea and hot chocolate that are also certified.

For an inside look, the documentary, "Black Gold," shown at the 2006 Sundance Film Festival, follows struggling coffee farmers in Ethiopia, the birthplace of coffee. Visit
