Coffee Prices

adrimm says on Mar 11, 2005, 16:18:

Yes but Who pockets the increase?

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Miguel says on Mar 11, 2005, 16:19:

"According" Sorry about the typo...need more coffee.

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Miguel says on Mar 11, 2005, 16:20:

No se adrimm Maybe Tinto will know more about the "tinto".

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dwmte says on Mar 11, 2005, 18:59:

FYI count on it, the profiteer is not juan valdez and his campesino buddies. it's an elite cartel that controls the show and probably lives in miami.

it should also be noted, that the colombian government and private interests built, many years ago, the largest warehouses for coffee in the world, in the high andes. above the permafrost level where the temperature is below freezing all the time. therein is stored a more than 10 year supply of coffee!!! soooooo any shortages are all created/controlled. get used to it.

dw.

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ARMacleod says on Mar 12, 2005, 07:37:

Dwmte. Hola amigo.

I saw a program on the travel channel some time ago and it was about a guy travelling through various countries in Suramerica.

initially it was interesting enough, in Venezuela he even had a chat with that idiot who now dictates the country.

The point I would like to make is the one where he visited some of the Colombian and close neighbour countries and talked with the Campesino amongst others.

My heart went tout to one family father mother and a large family of young children, all hungry? they were and still are coffee farmers and the pittance that they get for the crop is just enough to keep them on a starvation diet, why?

All over Europe there is a system of 'Fair Trade' in operation, recently introduced. It would appear that a few people in some kind of committee decide where the produce is coming from and the traditional markets are consequently suffering as a result of the decision, to, in this case, buy coffee from countries other than Colombia, this is to assist the people in those poor countries make a living wage.

It is now, it appears, a case of robbing Peter to pay Paul.

Another case this where the demagogues in power have the fate of many in their corrupt hands I have already seen cases where the money had been misappropriated and ended up in the pockets of persons already rather flush with money.

One quick example, the new Land Rover Discovery which a team of ‘advisors' swan around in are changed every year, fully fitted with all mod cons?

Corruption reigns supreme even in so called charitable organisations and not in Colombia, in Europe.

God, sometimes life sucks!

ab intra fortuna favet (il hoi polloi)

The brain is like a parachute, it only functions correctly when it is open. Pax vobiscum.

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Bruce V. Shrader says on Mar 13, 2005, 07:30:

coffee prices My colombian wife retired from
The Federation National de Cafeteros,
after working for them for 30 years.

we have followed the dealings of the federation
for many years. Sadly, many of the "cafeteros"
have quit growing coffee and gone into other
lines of work. simply because they could not
make a decent profit.

I noticed, for instance, in a Publix supermarket,
that Colombian "Supremo" was selling for over
$8.00 a pound. I can assure you that this money
is not going to the cafeteros, they are getting
no where near this price.

Coffee, BTW, is a labor intensive crop. IE, the
growing of coffee is all done by hand. The fields
are worked by hand and the coffee is picked by hand.
They are simply being starved out of business.

When I first went to Colombia, Back in 1964,
There were happier times for them.
The Vietnam war was going on and Colombia was a
prime exporter of Coffee.
Now, 30 years later, you will find that Vietnam is
a major coffee exporter.

Colombia still produces "The world's best Coffee", but
their share of the world market has been reduced greatly
because of Vietnam. Which, BTW, produces a coffee which is
inferior to Colombian Coffee.

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juanalejo says on Mar 13, 2005, 12:00:

dwnte Well it is not an elite that lives in Miami that profits from this nor it is the coffee growers. It is actually the coffee companies in the US and Europe who make the large profit. Nestle, Foldgers etc. A different story has to do with a better price specifically for Colombian Coffee and that has to do with the marketing campaign done by the Federación which has placed Colombian coffee at the premium price range. The Juan Valdez stores are just a beginning of a long term campaign to commercialize Colombian coffee under its own brand, first opening the cafe´s and then with the years entering with the Juan Valdez brand into the supermarkets. Then the middle man that pockets the profit will not be a company based in New York or Zurich but one based in Bogotá.

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dwmte says on Mar 13, 2005, 12:25:

don juan... you're right, but having lived a number of years in el campo and having an understanding of the 'status quo' at work there, the workers and their families will NOT be seeing an increase of pesos into their pockets. not now, not ever. it's just the way the landowners have it, want it, keep it. there's no altruism lurking in the shadows there.

were it not that colombia is truly fertile, the people of colombia would starve...literally. those who live on and work on the fincas/farms, must depend on what they can grow, to live. ANYONE, who has been out there knows that. it's not some sweet fairyland where the 'boss' man is mr. nice guy and thinks of his workers before himself. let's all me honest.

if it weren't for the incredible resilience of the colombian people, there would be a real revolution there.

viva colombia and colombians.

dw

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adrimm says on Mar 13, 2005, 14:43:

'Nother note of realism Anyone here who buys shade-grown coffee with the idea that they are supporting coffee operations that retain some indigenous trees and habitat also ought to know that in most cases shade-grown operations were once regular operations and the trees that most have are NOT indigenous to the region, but rather a species selected becuase it grows to a large size so quickly.

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Dolfi says on Mar 14, 2005, 04:20:

Fair Trade would indeed be a very good thing for Colombia. most of it is still coming from Guatemala.

http://www.globalexchange.org/campaigns/fairtrade/coffee/

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