Roast Your Own Coffee
If you are a true coffee aficionado you may choose to roast your own coffee. What does this entail? Can you get good at it? What do you have to buy? We looked on the internet for a list of coffee roasters and found a few suggestions and brands. Here is some info if you want to start to roast your own green coffee beans.
Roasting Devices
You can roast your own coffee in something as simple as a popcorn popper or with a programmed coffee roaster in the $1,000 range. We will start with the popcorn popper approach.
West Bend 82416 Air Crazy Hot Air Popcorn Popper
This is a popcorn popper for 4 quarts of popcorn. It uses hot air and no oil. This device lists on the West Bend site for $29.99. If you are going to use this approach you will need to experiment with small quantities. People who have tried this approach say that it is all too easy to go from a light roast to a charred dark roast in 30 seconds of excessive roasting. But the price is right! Just remember that this is a popcorn popper.
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- No oil required! Pops up to 4 quarts of healthy and delicious popcorn.
- Popcorn pops using hot air in 3 minutes for a super speedy snack.
- Includes ½ cup measuring cup that doubles as a convenient butter melter.
- Popper base is only 5.5 inches in diameter; this slim appliance can fit in any spot on your countertop, rec room, or studio.
- Quick, clean, and easy. Popcorn on demand!
- 1040 watts
Whirly Pop
This is another popcorn popper. The stovetop whirley pop is $24.99 online at the Whirley Pop website. Just remember that this device is made to pop popcorn and experiment a lot. Again, the price is right.
Did you know that hand-cranked stove top popcorn poppers are the best way to make movie theater style popcorn at home? It’s true! The Whirley Pop Popcorn Maker is a favorite for families and popcorn lovers alike who adore the taste of hot, fresh popcorn straight from the cinema – without having to leave the kitchen!
Nesco and Fresh Roast
These are real coffee roasters in the $100 to $200 price range, Nesco Home Coffee Roaster and Fresh Roast SR 500. With these devices you can more accurately aim for a light, medium or dark roast with the assurance that you will come close to what you want.
The Fresh Roast SR500 has the same capacity ( 4 scoops , 120 gm) and features of the SR300 – plus three temperature settings that can be adjusted any time during the roasting process. High temp. = 490 degrees Medium temp. = 455 degrees Low temp. = 390 degrees A Fan Speed Control has been added that allows the finest tuning of the roast.
Behmor, Gene Café or HotTop
The Behmor 1600, Gene Café Drum Roaster and HotTop KN8828-Basic fall in the $300 to $800 range with added bells and whistles for each increase in price. Each of these companies offers a range of products devoted coffee roasting.
TopHot KN8828-Programmable
This Top Hot product goes for around $1,000. Like all of the other high end roasters it is more likely to give you exactly the degree of roast that you want once to get the hand of it. And like all of the high end roasters it is more time consuming and tedious to clean.
The point of this quick review is that if you want to roast your own healthy organic coffee there are a range of options, each with its advantages and drawbacks.
What Does Sustainable Mean?
Organic coffee is not only good for you but it is good for the environment because organic coffee growers use sustainable farming practices. The United States Department of Agriculture tells us that USDA certified coffee must meet standards upon inspection.
Organic food is produced by farmers who emphasize the use of renewable resources and the conservation of soil and water to enhance environmental quality for future generations. Organic meat, poultry, eggs, and dairy products come from animals that are given no antibiotics or growth hormones. Organic food is produced without using most conventional pesticides; fertilizers made with synthetic ingredients or sewage sludge; bioengineering; or ionizing radiation. Before a product can be labeled ‘organic,’ a Government-approved certifier inspects the farm where the food is grown to make sure the farmer is following all the rules necessary to meet USDA organic standards. Companies that handle or process organic food before it gets to your local supermarket or restaurant must be certified, too.”
The term often used to describe the constellation of practices in organic farming is sustainability. But what does sustainable mean really? To a large degree this term has been hijacked by big and non-organic food companies to attract buyers. Here are some thoughts on sustainability.
Regenerative versus Degenerative
Alternet writes about how we should stop using the term sustainable and instead use regenerative or degenerative. They suggest a regeneration revolution.
With the “sustainability” label co-opted by Big Food, it’s time to re-frame agriculture into two categories: regenerative and degenerative.
Last week, PoliticoPro reported that the U.S. Secretary of Agriculture wants “farmers and agricultural interests to come up with a single definition of sustainability in order to avoid confusing the public with various meanings of the term in food and production methods.”
We agree with Secretary Tom Vilsack that the word “sustainability” is meaningless to consumers and the public. It’s overused, misused and it has been shamelessly co-opted by corporations for the purpose of greenwashing.
Their argument is that at best sustainable practices maintain the status quo and at worst the term is used as an outright lie. Their proposal is that people should be able to choose food that is produced using organic regenerative practices based on sound ecological principles that rejuvenate the soil, grasslands and forests; replenish water; promote food sovereignty; and restore public health and prosperity – all while cooling the planet by drawing down billions of tons of excess carbon from the atmosphere and storing it in the soil where it belongs.
The point being that it is possible to repair the earth and not just maintain the status quo. The problem is if people are willing to pay the cost by purchasing more expensive food.
Individual Shopping Decisions
Whole Foods Market is a supermarket chain where you can reliably find lots of great organic food. Whole Foods is also commonly referred to as whole paycheck! We recently wrote about the most popular coffee brands.
The ranking of the top 5 sellers with sales in billions is this:
- Keurig, $2.57 billion
- Folgers, $1.56 billion
- Starbucks, $950 million
- Maxwell House, $820 million
- Dunkin’ Donuts, $420 million
Major factors for many people when they buy coffee are convenience and price.
The fact of the matter is that Folgers, Maxwell House and Dunkin’ Donuts are not selling high end shade grown, fair trade organic coffee. They are providing a reasonable product for a reasonable price. This does not mean that we should not be able to get truth in labeling however. What does sustainable mean? The word has been coopted by big business and has lost much of its meaning. It is a good idea to look for better ways to describe coffee and all foods that are grown using practices that replenish and improve the environment. Then the consumer can make an informed decision.
Why Is Coffee Called Java?
Have you ever wondered why some people refer to coffee as java? For that matter how the expression a cup of Joe come about? The reason for why coffee is called java is clear and the reason we ask for a cup of Joe is questionable. Let’s go back in time to the era called The Age of Exploration which lasted from the 15th to 17th century (1400 to 1600) and before.
Cup of Java
Trade with the East
Silk Road
Trade between the Far East and Europe took place over the Silk Road, an ancient network of roads extending from China and India through Asia and the Middle East. The European connection was the Western capital of the Roman Empire, Constantinople. When Islamic armies gained strength in the late 1300’s they cut off the supply of silks, spices and other goods that flowed through Constantinople into the Mediterranean Basin. Half a century before the fall of Constantinople ship owners and traders from Italy took their skills and boats and set up shop in Portugal and Spain. From there they explored and set up trade routes along the coast of Africa eventually rounding the continent and sailing to India in 1497-99.
Vasco de Gama Voyage to India
The Spanish and Portuguese colonized South and Central America and the British and French soon followed. However, it was the Dutch traders who first colonized Australia, the East Indies and even New York (New Amsterdam). The Dutch are responsible for finding the coffee plants in East Africa and planting them on their island colonies including the Indonesian island of Java in the 1500’s.
Island of Java
Until a coffee leaf rust plague wiped out most of the plants on Java in the 1880s it was a global supplier of coffee, thus the name Java. Calling coffee Joe is a different story.
Why Do We Call It Joe?
The most credible origin for calling coffee Joe is that it started as a combination of Java and the drink that you find in a coffee house, Mocha. Dating back to the 1930’s some people used the expression jamoke for a mixture of coffee and chocolate. As is the nature of slang expressions they get shortened over time and Joe came into being. There are several theories but unlike the very clear origin of calling coffee Java the cup of Joe story is lost in time.
Can You Get Coffee from Java Today?
The old colonial plantations producing Arabica coffee on Java are shadows of their former selves producing only fraction of Indonesian coffee output. The main coffee coming from this part of the world is Robusta which is leaf rust resistant and the source of coffee for virtually all non-coffee caffeinated drinks.
How about a Cup of Mocha?
Mocha is a coffee, milk and chocolate drink. Start with espresso and add steamed milk followed by chocolate syrup. This drink should not be confused with Ethiopian mocha beans which are coffee but with a chocolate flavor. And no matter what the origin of Java and cup of Joe, enjoy your coffee, preferably the healthy organic variety.
Coffee for the Birds
Everyone likes their coffee and coffee is good for your health as well. But many of us are concerned about the environment, global warming and the loss of species. Birds are especially vulnerable to deforestation and here is where coffee comes into the picture. When large farming operations cut down trees to plant sun-tolerant coffee they remove habitat for birds. A thoughtful article from the Taos News looks at coffee for birds.
For sure, the bright scarlet package with a picture of a colorful macaw soaring upward and smack into the words COSTA RICA catches my eye. So I grab the bag of coffee from the supermarket shelf. But before I plunk it into my shopping cart, something tells me to check out the label. I read “whole bean” and “dark roast level.” I turn the bag over and find the part that might have the info I’m looking for. I find a sustainability statement. Sounds good, but I want to make sure that the coffee I’m about to buy comes from coffee fields friendly – or at least not hostile – to the birds I’ve been enjoying all summer long here in Northern New Mexico.
The author goes on to point out that many birds that spend their summers in the USA spend their winters in Mexico, Central America and even South America. They live in mountain forests in these regions, the same places that coffee is grown. As sun-tolerant varieties of coffee have been developed, coffee farmers have cut down upland tropical forests and planted coffee. They may have planted the occasional plantain to help prevent wholesale soil erosion but have removed the habitat for local and migratory birds. The question is, if you want to limit your coffee purchases to growers who maintain bird-friendly habitats how do you proceed? The author mentions Rainforest Alliance, USDA Certified, shade grown, Fair Trade and sustainable and asks “what does it all mean?” In the end it turns out that the Smithsonian Migratory Bird Center has the strictest certification followed by Rainforest Alliance for coffee farming that is kindest to the birds.
Smithsonian Migratory Bird Center
The Smithsonian Migratory Bird Center has a Bird Friendly Coffee page on their web site.
The Smithsonian Migratory Bird Center has developed the only 100% organic and shade-grown coffee certification available: Bird Friendly.
That’s right-no other bag guarantees that every bean is produced organically and under high-quality shade. Our seal of approval ensures tropical “agroforests” are preserved and migratory birds find a healthy haven when they travel from your backyard to those faraway farms producing the beans you so enjoy every morning.
The point is that USDA certified and other certifications do not guarantee that the forest habitat was preserved while the Bird Friend Coffee certification does.
Rainforest Alliance
This is the second reliable certification if you want coffee for the birds. Rainforest Alliance coffee certification requires that coffee farmers follow strict standards.
The Rainforest Alliance works with coffee farmers to improve their livelihoods and the health and well-being of their communities. Coffee farms or groups of smallholder farmers that earn the Rainforest Alliance Certified™ seal are audited annually against a rigorous standard with detailed environmental, social and economic criteria. These criteria are designed to protect biodiversity, deliver financial benefits to farmers, and foster a culture of respect for workers and local communities. Rainforest Alliance certification also promotes decent living and working conditions for workers, gender equity and access to education for children in farm communities.
If you specifically want great coffee for the birds, look for Bird Friendly Coffee or the Rainforest Alliance seal.
Ethiopia, Coffee and Injera
Coffee was discovered in the East African country of Ethiopia by a man tending his goats (which become so energetic after eating beans from the plant that they did not sleep at night). Although coffee has certainly moved on from the highlands of Ethiopia and adjacent Eritrea coffee is still part of the culture. When guests arrive at a traditional home in Ethiopia or Eritrea it is common to sit around a low table, make and drink coffee and eat various meats, fruits and vegetable wrapped in Injera bread. CulinaryLore.com tells us about Injera.
Injera (or engera) is a large, flat crepe-like spongy bread that is a staple source of carbohydrates in Ethiopia and Eritrea. It is made from tef (or teff), a millet-like grain native to Ethiopia.
The large pieces of spongy bread serves as both the dish for meals, which is used for a variety of different stews or sauces, especially wat, Ethiopias spicy, and sometimes fiery, curry-like stew.
Injera is popular in Ethiopia and among Ethiopian and Eritrean expats across the world. In addition it is popular with individuals who cannot eat wheat products containing the protein gluten. The teff flour from which Injera is made is gluten free!
Meal with Injera Bread
Injera is a spongy kind of sourdough bread made from teff grass, the preferred grain of Northeast Africa. When eating at a traditional Ethiopian mean one tears off a section of Injera and uses it to pick up food from the platter, wrapping the food with the Injera like with a taco and then eating. Coffee in traditional Ethiopian setting is made at the table.
Ethiopian Coffee Ceremony
Making coffee in Ethiopia is referred to as the coffee ceremony according to epicurean.com.
In a world where time has long become a commodity, the Ethiopian coffee ceremony takes us back to a time when value was given to conversation and human relations. Perhaps an ancient proverb best describes the place of coffee in Ethiopian life, “Buna dabo naw”, which when translated means “Coffee is our bread!”
The roasting of the coffee beans is done in a flat pan over a tiny charcoal stove, the pungent smell mingling with the heady scent of incense that is always burned during the ceremony. The lady who is conducting the ceremony gently washes a handful of coffee beans on the heated pan, then stirs and shakes the husks away. When the coffee beans have turned black and shining and the aromatic oil is coaxed out of them, they are ground by a pestle and a long handled mortar. The ground coffee is slowly stirred into the black clay coffee pot locally known as ‘jebena’, which is round at the bottom with a straw lid. The lady finally serves the coffee in tiny china cups to her family, friends and neighbors who have waited and watched the procedure for the past half-hour.
Drinking coffee in Ethiopia is a social event along with eating Injera bread. Coffee is not only part of the eating culture in Ethiopia it is an integral part of the economy.
Ethiopian Coffee
The birthplace of coffee is still a producer of high quality Arabica coffee. Coffee in Ethiopia grows wild and can be harvested directly from forests. Alternatively farmers thin the forest canopy in order to increase production but still produce shade grown coffee. Like in Colombia coffee is grown everywhere including in the back yard where it is referred to as garden coffee. And there are coffee plantations where regular coffee is produced on an industrial scale. Ethiopian Specialty Coffee describes these levels of Ethiopian coffee production.
There are four types of production systems in Ethiopia: forest coffee, semi- forest coffee, garden coffee and plantation coffee. 95% of the coffee production from these systems can be considered as organic, although not yet officially certified.
Ethiopia is the number three producer of Arabica coffee behind Brazil and Colombia.
Ethiopian Coffee Ceremony
Colombian Economy and a Shortage of Coffee Pickers
When we think about the quality of regular or healthy organic coffee we usually think about sustainable agriculture, certification and coffee varieties. As a rule the state of the economy does not come to mind. Nevertheless, this article is about the Colombian economy and a shortage of coffee pickers. Bloomberg Business writes that coffee workers quit to build Colombian highways leaving coffee to rot during the harvest season.
Colombian coffee growers face soaring labor costs and harvesting delays as pickers leave for better-paid construction jobs.
Producers of the famed Arabica beans brewed by companies including Starbucks Corp. are paying workers twice what they received two years ago. Still, the labor shortages are leaving coffee beans on trees longer, allowing them to fall to the ground, where beetles can bore into the cherries.
“For every three workers we need, we have two,” said Juan David Rendon, head of the Andes Coffee Cooperative, whose members have about 35,000 hectares (86,000 acres). “Infrastructure in Colombia has been demanding a lot of manpower.”
The source of this dilemma lies in the world economy and especially the USA and China. The US has developed fracking technology to extract more and more oil and natural gas. And the Chinese economy has slowed significantly. The problem for Colombia is that it is an oil exporter and oil prices have fallen by half over the last year. According to Beta, Colombia uses hydroelectric power for its electricity and exports most of its oil.
In recent years, Colombia has increased its importance as an energy producer in the Western Hemisphere. Colombia is currently the third-largest oil producer in Latin America and is the seventh-largest crude exporter to the United States. Colombia is also the largest coal producer in South America.
The Colombian peso has fallen from 1,800 to the dollar to 3,000 to the dollar and jobs in the oil sector are getting hard to find. The Colombian government is doing what the USA, Europe, China and others are doing. They are creating jobs by improving infrastructure. In this case Colombia is building about 1,500 of roads through mountainous terrain. These jobs pay better than picking coffee and at least for the duration of these projects the jobs are year-round rather than season like in the coffee industry. This is relationship between the Colombian economy and shortage of coffee pickers.
Fewer Pickers and More Brocca
Brocca is an infestation of coffee beans by the coffee borer beetle. Not only are coffee beans not being harvested in time but when they fall to the ground the coffee borer beetles move in.
A major threat to coffee crops in various locations throughout the world is the coffee borer beetle. Hypothenemus hampei, its scientific name, is a small beetle native to Angola in Southern Africa. Over the 20th century is spread to the Americas and to Hawaii. The coffee borer beetle is threat to coffee crops wherever it is found. In the Latin American regions where the pest if found it goes by the names barrenador del café, gorgojo del café and broca del café. Infestation spread via the inadvertent transport of infected beans. The primary way to continue to produce healthy organic coffee when there is an infestation is to hand sort the bean and dry promptly after picking.
The problem, of course, is that if you do not have enough pickers because they are working on highway construction, you also do not have enough people to sort the beans and throw out the infected ones. Then when you store the beans prior to transport the infection spreads!
Coffee Varieties: Sarchimor
A coffee variety more resistant to coffee leaf rust than most is sarchimor. This is a hybrid between the Costa Rican Villa Sarchi coffee and a Timor variety. Timor coffee itself is a hybrid between Arabica and robusta which is what gives the coffee its leaf rust resistance. Besides being grown today in Costa Rica, the sarchimor variety is grown in India.
Coffee Leaf Rust Resistance
The leading quality of this coffee is its leaf rust resistance. Coffee leaf rust is a plant disease that not only kills coffee plants but wipes out coffee plantation.
A seemingly eternal threat to growing healthy organic coffee is a fungus that is native to the tropics where coffee is grown. Leaf rust attacks coffee crops and leaf rust kills organic coffee crops. If an organic grower is unable to treat the problem with non-chemical means he risks losing his crop and his livelihood. The fungus’ proper name is Hemileia vastatrix. When it is not controlled the disease kills coffee plants and reduces coffee growers to poverty. It starts as an orange to yellow somewhat powdery discoloration on the underside of the leave of the coffee plant. It begins as spots, less than a millimeter in diameter and grows to millimeters diameter with a pale yellow discoloration. It is known among Latin American coffee growers as “roya.” The issue for organic growers is that quarantine and destruction of individual plants is not always effective. Thus a grower who has put the time, effort, and money into getting organic coffee certification may lose everything unless he turns his back on organic practices and spays the heck out of his coffee plants. Then he can only sell his produce at regular coffee prices and not the higher prices that good quality organic coffee commands. If he loses his crop he needs to replant, probably after spraying the soil, and wait several years for new coffee plants to reach maturity.
The ideal approach to coffee leaf rust is to find a variety that has native resistance such as sarchimor or cross breed with Timor strains to produce leaf rust resistance strains such as the Colombian Coffee Growers Federation did in combating the disease.
The Colombian Approach
Colombia developed new varieties to combat leaf rust.
When coffee leaf rust swept into Latin America the Colombian coffee research organization, Cenicafé started work on producing a Colombian leaf rust resistant coffee. This was in the 1980s. Today Colombian leaf rust resistant coffee comes in two varieties, Colombian and Castillo. The first is a cross between an old Colombian variety, Caturra, and a rust-resistant strain from Southeast Asia, the Timor hybrid. Castillo is an offshoot of further cross breeding of the first Colombian leaf rust resistant coffee strain. Replanting with Colombian leaf rust resistant coffee in Colombia has reduced the incidence of leaf rust from 40% to 5% from 2011 to 2013.
Similar to sarchimor, the new Colombian varieties use traits of the Timor hybrid to combat this lethal plant disease. One can find healthy organic coffee in all of these varieties as any are amenable to the sustainable growing practices required for organic coffee certification.
Coffee Varieties: Blue Mountain
Jamaican Blue Mountain coffee is known throughout the world. As it turns out Blue Mountain is its own coffee variety although the same coffee is called PNG Gold in Papua New Guinea and Boyo in Cameroon. Aside from its lack of bitterness this coffee is derived from typica and has some natural resistance to coffee berry disease.
Tipica Coffees
Tipica originated in Yemen and is the forbearer of many sub varieties in use today.
Coffee varieties are the subspecies of coffee that occur by natural selection and by selective breeding. Disease resistance, yield and flavor vary from variety to variety. Variety or breed selection is critical to the planter as he or she must pick the optimal variety for altitude, sun or shade, soil conditions and climate. Regarding coffee varieties here are a couple of terms:
Variety: A variety is a smaller group than a subspecies and a larger group than a form. A variety has most of the characteristics of the species but differs in specific ways.
Cultivar: This is a cultivated variety and is developed using agricultural breeding techniques. The coffee in your cup is most likely a cultivar. Two common cultivars are Bourbon and Typica.
Typica
Typica is an old coffee variety and the father of numerous sub-varieties. Typica came from Yemen. Dutch traders carried it to Malabar, India and later on to Indonesia. Subsequently Typica arrived at the French colony of Martinique in the West Indies. Natural selection and breeding have produced the following new varieties:
Criollo (South America)
Arabigo (Americas)
Kona (Hawaii)
Pluma Hidalgo (Mexico)
Garundang (Sumatra)Blue Mountain (Jamaica, Papua New Guinea, Cameroon)
San Bernado & San Ramon (Brazil)
Kents & Chickumalgu (India)
The end result of years of development is the mild, flavorful and famous Blue Mountain coffee variety as well as Kona coffee from Hawaii.
Kona
Kona coffee is also a typica coffee and equally as famous as Blue Mountain.
Organic Kona coffee is grown on mountainous slopes on the Big Island of Hawaii. Kona coffee benefits from mild weather and moist growing conditions as well as the volcanic soil of the Hawaiian Islands. Because of its scarcity as well as its quality Kona coffee is one of the world’s most expensive coffees. Organic Kona coffee is therefore rarer and somewhat more expensive. Coffee was first grown in the Hawaiian Island in the early 19 th century from cuttings brought form Brazil. The Kona brand itself dates back to the 19 th century and an Englishman, Henry Nicholas Greenwell. Although Hawaiian coffee was first grown on large plantations a crash in the worldwide coffee market in 1899 led owners to lease or sell land to their workers. This started a tradition of family operated coffee farms of five to twelve acres. The fact that families continue to grow on the same land has led to the tradition of sustainable coffee growing that is the hallmark of growing healthy organic coffee.
Both Kona and Blue Mountain have their adherents and both are great coffees.
Jamaican Blue Mountain Coffee
Blue Mountain coffee from Jamaica has become a sought after and expensive coffee. Eighty percent of this coffee is exported to Japan. In Jamaica, in order to be Blue Mountain coffee, it has to be grown between 3000 and 5000 feet. Anything above or below that altitude is not Blue Mountain coffee despite coming from the same coffee variety!
International Coffee Day
The first International Coffee Day was October 1, 2015. Sponsored by the International Coffee Association this day is meant to promote fair trade coffee and raise awareness of the plight of coffee growers. The promoters hope to make this a yearly event. Your favorite coffee shop may offer free cups of coffee but don’t expect to get your most fancy coffee house coffee for free! Since the focus of the day is fair trade coffee, just what is that?
Fair Trade Coffee
What is fair trade coffee? Years ago we wrote this:
Is fair trade coffee the same as healthy organic coffee? How does fair trade coffee differ from organic coffee and when are they the same thing? The original motive behind fair trade coffee was to develop coffee trade relationships based on respect, transparency, and dialogue between producers and sellers. The point is to guarantee fair prices to small coffee growers who would otherwise have no access to fair pricing. At its heart fair trade coffee is an idea for social betterment more so than a way to make better coffee. There is a “Fairtrade” coffee brand for which coffee packers pay a fee, a “Fairtrade” logo and brand name. Coffee carrying this name must come from an associated cooperative. In general cooperatives only sell part of their harvest as fair trade coffee because of lack of demand.
Demand, Certification and Cost
One of the premier coffee growers in Panama grows coffee that is organic in all respects except the name. The grower in question paid Bio Latina to certify his coffee on behalf of the USDA.
If your organic coffee originated in Latin America it is likely that it was subject to Bio Latina organic coffee certification. Bio Latina is located in Lima, Peru. The company certifies farms, ranches, and forests for sustainable practices on behalf of organizations throughout the world. Bio Latina certifies in Bolivia, Peru, Colombia, Nicaragua and Venezuela as well as in Panamá, Honduras, Guatemala, El Salvador Ecuador and Mexico. The label on a bag of healthy organic coffee from Latin America may say that it is USDA certified. However, it may be Bio Latina organic coffee certification on behalf of the USDA that guarantees a pure cup of organic coffee.
And the grower in question paid the required fee for three years. And he never sold any more coffee and never was able to charge any more for his coffee. After three years this well-known Panama coffee grower continued to make the great Panama Mountain Grown Organic Coffee that he always did, but without the certification. Our point is that the same situation exists with fair trade coffee. The value of International Coffee Day is to increase awareness of the situation and encourage coffee drinkers to specify Fair Trade when they purchase at the coffee shop and look for fair trade when they visit the coffee roaster. Fair trade coffees are typically of very high quality and usually organic in practice even if they are not officially certified as such.