Sustainable Development Goals

#5 Gender Equality

For the past 3 years we have bought coffee from a cooperative in Rwanda that supports all women’s coffee growing groups. We have highlighted and raised money for the Hingakawa women’s coffee cooperative and even named one of our coffees after the mountain where they pick their coffee cherries.

We believe giving more women in coffee growing countries the opportunity to own their farms, be in charge of decision-making and be fully and properly rewarded for growing and harvesting their coffee is a critical element in bringing greater equality to their gender, their society and their chances to take care of their families.

We will continue to search out more farms that are owned and run by women.

#8 Decent work and economic growth

Over 70% of the world’s coffee farmers live below a sustainable level, forced by prevailing market conditions and immense coffee corporations and middlemen to sell their coffee below a living income level. A vicious cycle that stops farmers growing out of their often impoverished state.

We work through small import partners to bring our green coffee directly from the farms to our Roastery in Amsterdam. We can trace our coffees right back to the farm it came from and the price the farmer was paid. We pay the right price for the exceptional quality we receive. Not only ‘fair’ but enough for the farmer and his community to make a living income.

We also pay a premium on all our coffees that is reinvested in programmes on that farm or that cooperative to improve quality such as land rehabilitation, reversing soil erosion, and fully equipped testing labs. Education programmes around processing methods help to maximise the potential in all the coffees and the price that will be paid for them.

This helps farmers grow. Helps families and communities thrive. And creates a more virtuous circle.

In 2022 we will begin a programme to support additional farms and communities through our purchasing power and knowledge.

#10 Reduce inequalities

The coffee value is massively weighed in favour of the end producer, not the farmer. Very lop-sided. All right-minded coffee people want to push more of this value creation back down the chain towards the farmer.

One way is to shorten that value chain by having less people in the chain, taking a profit at each stage.

We buy our coffees directly through small importers who buy directly from the farm. A very short chain that delivers a living income as a minimum to all our farmers.

We are part of a wider community of fair trading coffee companies all doing the same, allowing the importers to demonstrate full transparency and invest time, energy and resources in cross promoting and improving the quality of coffee practices and farming methods to justify and increase the price of the coffee cherries produced.

#12 Responsible consumption and production

Our footprint on this planet is too great. Over consumption and harmful (often irresponsible) production methods have contributed massively to climate change, which is now having a knock on effect on coffee growing countries and their farmers. Available land for growing coffee trees is declining and as global temperatures rise, the previously balanced climatic mix that allows forests and coffee growing areas to flourish is tilted and coffee yields are declining. This pushes up prices as supply of coffee seems to be in doubt.

Living and eating healthier, greener, seems an obvious goal to us. Less meat, more plant based foods and materials is a growing positive trend.

Our plant-based coffee capsules are a small step to leaving a smaller footprint on our planet. A by-product of the sugar industry rather than being dug out of the ground with all the toxic emissions and energy that goes into making aluminium capsules is a better way to go.

Want to learn more? – for more information and explanations of the SDGs, go here: https://sdgs.un.org/goals.