Brewing Justice: Fair Trade Coffee, Sustainability, and SurvivalFair trade is a fast-growing alternative market intended to bring better prices and greater social justice to small farmers around the world. But is it working? This vivid study of coffee farmers in Mexico offers the first thorough investigation of the social, economic, and environmental benefits of fair trade. Based on extensive research in Zapotec indigenous communities in the state of Oaxaca, Brewing Justice follows the members of the cooperative Michiza, whose organic coffee is sold on the international fair trade market. It compares these families to conventional farming families in the same region, who depend on local middlemen and are vulnerable to the fluctuations of the world coffee market. Written in a clear and accessible style, the book carries readers into the lives of these coffee producer households and their communities, offering a nuanced analysis of both the effects of fair trade on everyday life and the limits of its impact. Brewing Justice paints a clear picture of the complex dynamics of the fair trade market and its relationship to the global economy. Drawing on interviews with dozens of fair trade leaders, the book also explores the changing politics of this international movement, including the challenges posed by the entry of transnational corporations into the fair trade system. It concludes by offering recommendations for strengthening and protecting the integrity of fair trade. |
Contents
Introduction | 1 |
1 A Movement or a Market? | 11 |
2 Coffee Commodities Crisis | 36 |
3 One Region Two Markets | 58 |
Livelihoods and Labor | 93 |
5 A Sustainable Cup? Fair Trade ShadeGrown Coffee and Organic Production | 133 |
Food Security and Migration | 165 |
7 Dancing with the Devil? | 199 |
The Limits of Fair Trade | 232 |
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Common terms and phrases
Accessed activists agricultural Alternative Trade beans benefits Café Cancún cash CEPCO coffee crisis coffee farmers coffee plots coffee prices coffee sales commodity consumers Contreras Díaz conventional producers corn corporate costs coyote crops ducers economic environmental export fair trade fair-trade coffee fair-trade families fair-trade market fair-trade members fair-trade movement fair-trade organizations fair-trade prices fair-trade producers fair-trade system farm food security global global South harvest hectares higher household income Inmecafé interview kilogram labor land libre Max Havelaar Mexican Mexico Michiza members migration milpa mozos neoliberal Nestlé Oaxaca City organic certification Oxfam participation in fair peasant percent pesos plant plantations Procter & Gamble producer groups producer organizations programs purchase Rainforest Alliance region remittances response Rincón de Ixtlán roasters says sell significant small farmers small producers social Starbucks sumers survey tion Trade Coffee Transfair USA transnational Tyrtania United village Yagavila and Teotlasco Zapotec