Robbing Coffee's Cradle - GM Coffee and It's Threat to Poor
Farmers
By ActionAid
The coffee crop relied
upon by more than 60 million people for all or part of their livelihood is
under threat.i The
market for this most valuable agricultural commodity has been volatile and
fragile for decades, overproduction is crippling the coffee market and driving
prices to all-time lows. Now industrial applications of GM coffee are poised to
fundamentally change coffee production at the risk of putting millions of
smallholder growers out of business.
The production of the
coffee we all drink is at a crossroads: it can either continue to be grown the
traditional way, producing high quality coffee that supports millions of
families and provides developing countries with large amounts of desperately
needed income, or it can be developed in ways that are designed to help huge
industrial plantations increase their profits and drive smallholder coffee
farmers out of business with no significant benefits for coffee drinkers.
Neither option is a foregone conclusion.
We consumers who buy and
drink coffee have a simple choice that can affect millions of lives.
In a world of increasingly
industrial agriculture, corporate control over the food chain and unfair
international trade rules, the GM coffee examined below is an unnecessary
technology with a sting in its tail. While many GM companies insist that GM is
an important part of feeding a growing world, the example of GM coffee shows
that the irresponsible and unaccountable introduction of such technology can
actually drive people further into poverty and hunger. The motives behind GM
coffee are not altruistic.
This report outlines the
problems already faced by smallholder coffee farmers, why GM coffee is being
developed and how it can be stopped with your help.
How coffee is grown
Coffee has been grown
for centuries in traditional plots mixed with food by smallholder farmers and
their families. These farmers still produce 70 per cent of the world’s coffee
and contribute to safeguarding biodiversity of coffee and other plants. More
recently, however, huge plantations have begun to produce coffee in some
countries using industrial, usually chemically intensive, methods growing only
a single type of coffee in direct competition with smallholders.
Coffee grows in around 80
tropical countries. Three quarters of all beans are exported, mostly to Western
countries. Around 70 per cent of all coffee is grown by around seven million
poor farmers in plots ranging from small back yards to five-hectare farms.ii
For many smallholder farmers it is their sole source of income. Trees are
carefully tended and maintained in intricate integrated environments used for
many purposes. Smallholder coffee is generally ‘intercropped’ (grown on the
same land) with food crops. Coffee trees are often shaded by larger trees,
which improves the quality of the crop. In Brazil and Côte d’Ivoire, for
example, coffee trees grow in forested areas with shade from 50 other trees
providing cover. In countries such as Tanzania, Kenya and Uganda, coffee and
bananas grow in the same plot. In Cameroon, coffee grows alongside bush mango,
which is important to local economies, medicine and is also reported to help restore
soil fertility.iii iv In other environments, coffee trees provide shade for
food crops, helping to ensure food security for the farmer’s family. Many
smallholders – 90 per cent in the case of Ethiopia – grow coffee without
chemical fertilisers or pesticides. Intercropping and use of green mulches help
to control pests and disease and to retain moisture around the stems of coffee
trees in dry weather.
Thirty per cent of the
world’s coffee grows on larger farms and monocrop (single crop) plantations
ranging from 5 to over 5000 hectares. Many plantations are owned by huge Transnational
Corporations (TNCs) and are significant employers of local labour. In Brazil,
the world’s largest coffee producer, the average sized plantation is 1000
hectares. Most research and development into coffee growing aims to increase
the competitiveness of these plantations.v
Coffee berries, known as
cherries, containing the beans, grow on trees that range from small shrubs to a
height of 10 metres. Coffee cherries grow in tight clusters on the trees and
ripen at different times. This makes harvesting a labour intensive process. The
cherries must be picked by hand as they ripen,
usually over 3 to 4 months.
After harvesting their cherries, farmers usually wash, pulp and dry them before
selling. Mechanized strip harvesting technology has been introduced on larger
farms and plantations to reduce labour costs, but picking all the cherries at
the same time, whether ripe or unripe, lowers the quality of the crop. Attempts
have been made to force the ripening of coffee cherries by using the chemical
ethylene, a plant hormone. Such forced ripening again lowers quality.
Three quarters of
commercial coffee is Arabica, which is indigenous to the highlands of Ethiopia
and the Boma plateau in Sudan. It appears to have been cultivated first in
Arabia in the 14th century before spreading to other regions in the 17th
century.vi Noted for its aroma, taste and quality, Arabica coffee had become a
popular drink in the UK by 1650 and is now grown throughout Latin America, in
east and central Africa and India. Brazil and Colombia account for almost half
the world's Arabica production and exports.
Robusta coffee grows at
lower altitudes, chiefly in Vietnam, the largest producer, West Africa and
Indonesia. Used for blended and instant coffees, Robustas fetch approximately
half the price of Arabicas on world markets.
Trading coffee – the
first in line gets the least
With international trade
rules stacked against them, smallholder coffee farmers are caught in an
elaborate trading system where they do not hold power and are often exploited
by others operating in a volatile market.
Before the price
collapse in 2000, coffee was the world’s largest traded primary commodity after
oil. The world’s
coffee supply is controlled by four TNCs: Procter and Gamble, Kraft/Phillip
Morris, Sarah Lee and Nestlé.vii The drop in prices by half – down from 126
cents a pound to 65 cents a pound for Arabica coffee – was a severe blow both
to people who grow coffee and to countries dependent on it for most of their
foreign exchange. In Ethiopia, for example, a quarter of the population depend
on coffee and the crop provides the majority of the country’s earnings.
The world coffee price, and
likewise the price the grower receives, has a history of being highly volatile.
Cherries used to be purchased by coffee marketing boards in many countries.
While the inefficiency of these boards often meant that growers received only a
small proportion of the world price and had
to wait for payment, at
least they all received the same price and a guaranteed market outlet. In the
1980s International Monetary Fund (IMF)/World Bank structural adjustment
programmes abolished most of these boards, so growers now have to sell to
private traders.
Traders are in a
position to offer growers a higher proportion of the world price, yet many take
advantage of farmers’ lack of knowledge. Support for farmers is unreliable. ‘Our farmers are
aware of the world price, it’s announced daily on the radio and all the farmers
make a relationship between the world price and the price they expect to
receive,’ says Honduran Minister of Agriculture Guillermo Downing.viii A
spokesperson for the Ethiopia Coffee and Tea Authority claims, ‘Coffee growers
in Ethiopia receive about 75 per cent of the world coffee price.’ ix
Yet farmers report a much
different situation. The world price of coffee is broadcast daily in Ethiopia
on the radio, but only in the national Amharic language, which many coffee
growers do not speak. Even growers who speak Amharic are unlikely to know the
price, as probably less than 10 per cent of coffee growers in Ethiopia have
radios. Better-off growers can afford to store their cherries for several
months and choose when to sell. Poorer farmers, desperate for cash, often have
to sell as soon as the cherries are harvested. In a weak bargaining position,
they often receive much less than other growers.x
Ethiopian grower Purch
Awsato is one of them. He sold his 2000 crop for less than 13 cents per pound,
less than a quarter of the world price, ‘unwashed for a quick sale… I needed
the money’.xi Another
Ethiopian grower said: ‘The
traders come and tell me the price is low, and what can I do? I think I'm being
exploited by them, but have no means of checking. I have to accept their
price.’ xii In practice he received only half the world price for his 2000
crop.
The private trader system
has also led to long dealer chains. Coffee is traded up a line of dealers
before it is exported – in some cases it can change hands as many as 150 times
– and each raises the price of sale to the next up the line.xiii
This is one way the prices
on supermarket shelves become so far removed from the tiny prices growers earn.
Yet even if this trading system was improved, the rules of international
trade ensure that farmers and countries who grow coffee for export can never
make the most of their crop. Developed countries use escalating tariff
structures, that is systems whereby import duties increase as a product is
refined or manufactured. These prevent coffee exporting countries from
developing their coffee industries to the full. The same applies to other
important crops. For example, import tariffs on raw cocoa are set at one level
by importing countries, but import tariffs on processed cocoa powder are set
higher, and chocolate higher still. In effect this means it isn’t worthwhile
for cocoa-producing countries to add value to their crop by turning it into
chocolate; even though they can sell chocolate at a higher price than raw
cocoa, the tariffs cancel out any financial gain. In some developed countries
these tarriffs can reach peaks of 350 per cent or more.
The same dilemma applies to
coffee producing countries. It is no accident that while import duties on
unprocessed coffee are low and those on processed coffee are considerably
higher, the largest and most profitable coffee roasting and processing
industries are in the developed world. This system helps prevent developing
countries from building up value-added industries and thereby increasing their
export earnings.
In the run-up to the 1999
World Trade Organisation Ministerial meeting in Seattle, ActionAid stated, ‘It
is clear that tariff escalation is being used to protect jobs and the economies
of richer countries to the detriment of development elsewhere.’ It isn’t fair
and it should be stopped.
Farmers face crisis in a
plummeting international market
Coffee is a key
commodity crop that supports the majority of many developing countries’ income.
However when the bottom fell out in 2000 many smallholder farmers were sent to
the wall amid mounting pressure from plantations.
In late February 2001
the world price of Arabica coffee fell to below 60 cents a pound for the first
time for nine years, and that followed on the collapse by 50 per cent of prices
in 2000. According
to the International Coffee Organisation (ICO) estimates the average price of
producing coffee – based on a survey of 19 countries – is 65 cents a pound. By
Spring of 2001, most smallholder coffee growers were desperately hanging on,
hoping the world price would rise sharply, as it did in 1993 after 1992 lows, and
begin to provide them a reasonable income again. Many growers have given up in
the face of world coffee prices less than a quarter of their 1970 levels in
real terms. Their crop is becoming uneconomic to tend; maintenance costs are
higher than their return. Mexico, which harvested 6.3 million 60 kg bags in
2000, is expected to produce only 3.5 million bags in 2001.
Clearly farmers who cannot
even recoup their production costs are hard-pressed to provide for their
families, let alone continue growing. Hopes had been pinned on a plan by the
Association of Coffee Producing Countries (ACPC) to hold back a fifth of all
exports in an attempt to drive prices up. Retention began in October 2000, but
eight months later prices are still critically low and supply is still
outpacing demand.xiv Coffee production in 2000-1 will be 112.9 million 60 kg
bags, and consumption just over 102 million bags. Nearly 11 million bags will
therefore cause a surplus glut this year alone.xv Despite lowered production by
some countries, overproduction by others means there is simply too much coffee
on the market to support decent prices. By April 2001 coffee farmers in
Guatemala were burning their unsold coffee as fuel, and in Kenya farmers are
stockpiling coffee in a high-risk gamble that the price will rise.xvi
Despite this crisis, there
are pressures on some farmers to move to a more intensive form of production to
increase yields. Between 1978 and 1996, at least eight US Agency for
International Development (USAID) projects, totalling $81 million, tried to
persuade coffee farmers in Latin America to use high-yielding varieties,
increase chemical use and remove shade trees – that is, to move from
intercropping to monocropping.xvii Increasing yields further will only worsen
the situation and drive more and more smallholder farmers out of business.
As if the situation isn't
bad enough for smallholder growers, a new threat looms on the horizon. Designed
to make industrialised plantations more profitable and increase the amount of
coffee on the international markets even further, genetically modified coffee
is coming
Problems with GM coffee–
a door closing on smallholders
Designed to assist
smallholders’ strongest competitors, GM coffee is utterly unsuitable for small
farms. It will also have a negative effect on biodiversity, weaken coffee’s
natural resilience and may have unpredictable environmental impacts. It also
transfers control over the crop from the hands of the farmer to the hands of
the company that provides, at a price, the ripening chemical.
Most wild species of
Arabica coffee are in southwest Ethiopia and are already under threat from
deforestation and resettlement.xxvi The importance of genetic diversity in
coffee is illustrated by Tewolde Egziabler, General Manager of Ethiopia’s
Environmental Protection Authority and African Spokesperson at the UN Food and
Agriculture Organisation negotiations on the International Undertaking for
Plant Genetic Resources for Food and Agriculture, when discussing a recent
disease outbreak:
‘When that disease
entered Ethiopia, it had minimal effect. There was plenty of diversity [of
coffee species], and a lot of resistance to coffee berry disease was discovered
and even though it hit coffee production, the impact was much smaller than had
been anticipated. Coffee production bounced back, the susceptible ones being
eliminated and the successful genotypes taking over. So whilst it was
disastrous in Eastern Africa and necessitated the use of massive amounts of
chemical applications, in Ethiopia… it became virtually unnecessary to use any
chemicals to fight the disease.’ xxvii
Enter GM coffee – a
traitor to nature
Scientists have found a
way to keep plantations ahead in the receding coffee market. A GM coffee is
being developed that will help them lower production costs by significantly
reducing the need to hire people to pick their coffee. It will also create an
absolute dependency on chemical companies for a harvest. Plantations may be in
a position to survive such developments. Smallholder coffee farmers are not.
On 23rd February 1999 the
University of Hawaii (UH) was granted a US patent for GM coffee based on what
is already known about using ethylene to encourage the ripening of coffee
cherries. Patent number US 5,874,269, entitled ‘Purified proteins, recombinant
DNA sequences and processes for controlling the ripening of coffee plant’,
makes 48 wide-ranging claims.xviii It describes how UH biotechnologists have
‘switched off’ the natural ripening process of coffee cherries. The cherries
from GM coffee can only ever ripen when sprayed with the naturally occurring
plant hormone ethylene, which triggers the final stages of fruit ripening.
Plants make their own
ethylene from two enzymes. Hawaiian researchers isolated genetic sequences for
the enzymes from Arabica coffee plants and linked them to a powerful
‘on-switch’ commonly used in plant genetic modification. They used a method
known as ‘particle bombardment’ to modify Arabica plants with these genetic
constructs and bombarded coffee plant cells with small gold beads coated in
these constructs and other genes. Researchers hope that they will be able to
grow genetically modified coffee plants from these cells.
Integrated Coffee
Technologies Inc (ICTI) was set up in Hawaii to commercialise GM coffee, and is
also working on GM tea and cocoa. ‘They (the growers) are going to be able to
increase their yields and decrease their labour… by perhaps 50 per cent as
compared to selected picking,’ says John Stiles of ICTI.xxiv Dr Stiles is a
former UH researcher and is listed on the patent as one of four inventors of
the GM ripening-controlled coffee. The technology is intended to help larger
farmers and plantation owners to raise their profits by employing fewer people
for harvesting and putting the money saved into increased planting and thereby
increasing their output. The main targets are Hawaii, Brazil and Central
America.
ICTI had an agreement with
Monsanto through a company called ForBio Tropical Plants to use Monsanto’s
patented enabling technologies for ICTI’s coffee products. At the time it was
agreed that, ‘in return, Monsanto has access... to our coffee ripening
technology for a licensing fee’, said ICTI.xxv The relationship between ICTI
and ForBio has reportedly broken down, and the link between ICTI and Monsanto
over the GM coffee seems to have gone with it. ICTI are now approaching other
biotech companies in order to gain access to their enabling technologies for
ripening-controlled coffee.
Loss of species through
plantation monocropping, lack of upkeep of small farms becoming increasingly
unprofitable or GM contamination would reduce or eliminate the possibility of
such natural resistance being developed. Dr Stiles hopes that GM coffee plants
will be available to farmers within 6-7 years. It then takes 3-4 years for
seedlings to produce their first crop. He is now trying to address technical
setbacks in order to produce GM coffee plants for sale. It appears that
ethylene is not suitable for use in fields because it disperses before plants
can absorb it when sprayed, so researchers are looking for a way around this
fundamental problem.
There is also some concern
that, as has happened with scientifically ‘improved’ agriculture in the past,
poor coffee farmers may, in desperation, be persuaded by promises of better
crops to take up GM coffee. Even if they know it was not designed for their
small farms (for example mechanised harvesting is impossible on uneven hillside
terrain among closely planted trees on small farms), smallholders facing
increased poverty may be enticed into the GM market. If they are, they will
find that: they can no longer grow their own seedlings and that GM seedlings
will be several times more expensive than traditional varieties; they will be
absolutely dependent on chemicals, and the companies that sell them, every year
to produce a crop. They will have handed over control of their crop and will be
vulnerable to increases in chemical prices; they will lose any intercropped
food because ethylene kills flowers, and since it often works in conjunction
with other plant hormones, it may also have other, unpredictable effects on
neighbouring plants.
It is crucial that farmers
considering GM coffee, even against the odds, get balanced, complete
information before making such fundamental decisions about their livelihoods.
Big companies looking forward to many years of profit from chemical sales
cannot be relied upon to provide unbiased recommendations. It is not just the
coffee farmers who will be affected by a move to ‘ripening-controlled’ coffee.
ActionAid Brazil’s Director
Ana Toni explains: ‘Our main fear is for Brazil’s coffee seedling industry.
Currently the market for coffee seedlings in Brazil is highly decentralised.
Coffee farmers can buy their seedlings from a variety of suppliers and have
liberty to produce their own seedlings, either for their own use or for sale.
With the introduction of patented GM coffee the seedling market in Brazil would
became much more rigid and small farmers would be on the losing side… Finally,
it is important to point out the potential dependency on TNCs with the
introduction of the GM coffee. At present the coffee seedling market is not
only decentralised but also national. The introduction of GM coffee produced
and patented by TNCs may make Brazil’s coffee increasingly dependent on
international input suppliers.’
It may seem to some that
it is too soon to be worrying about GM coffee, that the crops are nearly ten
years away from sale and that farmers are not yet affected. However, it is
precisely because GM coffee is not yet available that we can and must stop it
now. If the
research is completed and the coffee makes it to the fields it will be too
late. Getting a product withdrawn is far more difficult than preventing one
being brought to market at all. Furthermore, we cannot wait for the impact on
poor farmers to begin; the market is already too volatile and their position in
it too precarious to withstand any more.
Impact of GM coffee
–robbing coffee’s cradle
The list of likely
problems that will follow GM coffee is long and has serious implications for
smallholder farmers. Increased poverty, hunger, dependence on chemical
companies and loss of business loom large for them. Significant losses of
earnings and increased foreign debt await their countries.
There is no doubt that
ripening-controlled coffee was developed for plantations regardless of its
impact on smallholder farmers. Dr Tewolde Egziabler from Ethiopia agrees and says, ‘Small
farmers will be squeezed out of the market with GM coffee. It’s a shift from a
labour intensive to a capital intensive system, from small farmers to large
farmers.’
If GM ripening-controlled
coffee comes to market a number of effects are likely. Impacts on smallholder
growers include: those who rely on picking coffee for their income, many of
whom are struggling smallholder farmers, will suffer as plantations take up
mechanised harvesting and reduce their workforce; as smallholder farmers are
unable to compete, they will sell up to larger concerns and move to poor urban
centres to survive and plantations will grow; it will be even harder for
smallholder farmers to compete as plantation outputs increase and global coffee
prices drop further.
Wider impacts of GM coffee
include: when smallholders are driven out of business, countries like Uganda,
Ethiopia and others will then lose crucial export earnings while their foreign
debts rise; social unrest may increase in coffee growing areas as incomes
decrease and survival becomes more difficult. It is already known, for example,
that Uganda reports increases in robberies and suicides when prices are
lowest;xxvii farmers growing GM coffee will become dependent on agrochemical
companies for their harvests; an increasing proportion of coffee will be
chemically treated as plantations use significant amounts of chemical inputs –
notably herbicides, insecticides and fungicides; the high diversity of wild
coffee species, important to developing new strains and natural strength in
cultivated varieties, will be eroded and may be lost; monocrop plantations
vulnerable to disease and environmental degradation will have unpredictable
long-term productivity;xxix the biodiversity that integrated forest systems
protect will be threatened or lost; if genetic contamination of natural coffee
trees occurs, those farmers will become dependent on chemicals for their crop
as well; GURTs, already subject to international condemnation, will gain a
stronger hold in global agriculture;xxx high quality natural coffee may become
unavailable to consumers as the smallholder farmers who produce it go out of
business.
Coffee has a vital role
to play in development strategies as a cash crop that can be grown in a
sustainable manner and intercropped with food. It can improve food security,
provide a source of money for health care and education and help protect
biodiversity. Introducing a technology that increases the competitiveness of
one set of coffee farmers against others will exacerbate existing social and
economic imbalances within countries and between developing countries and
others.
Furthermore in a market
already suffering from chronic oversupply and prices at all-time lows, GM
coffee is an unnecessary and irresponsible technology. It may provide a few
huge plantation and the companies that own them a larger profit, but the cost
to millions will be too high to be acceptable. It is countries like Ethiopia,
the birthplace of coffee and still dependent on it, which stand to lose the
most. We can and must act now to stop the development of GM coffee and protect
the future of coffee and its farmers.
One answer is certified
Fairtrade coffee, the positive alternative.
Fairtrade coffee – it
does make a difference
Sustainable, fair and
fruitful, certified Fairtrade coffee can provide quality, quantity and value
for coffee drinkers while promoting and protecting a sustainable future for
coffee and farmers. Buying Fairtrade is easy, and every purchase helps increase
demand and strengthen the scheme.
While the development of GM
coffee threatens to further accelerate a trend towards mechanisation and
monocrop farming, the Fairtrade movement represents a positive alternative.
Based on the principles of ensuring that a fair price is paid to smallholder
farmers in a long-term, contracted relationship that includes offering part of
the price up front as credit, Fairtrade has the potential to make a big
difference to the food security of millions of families in the developing
world.
There are currently
around half a million smallholder coffee farmers who receive a fair price for
their crop through membership of farmers’ organisations signed up to the
Fairtrade scheme. These
co-operatives sell directly to coffee buyers and roasting companies who comply
with the criteria set and monitored by the international umbrella group,
Fairtrade Labelling Organisations (FLO) International. Some Fairtrade roasters
also run producer support and development programmes, working directly with
growers to improve their product and their business.
Experience has shown that
farmers are likely to use the additional income they gain from the Fairtrade
market to invest in projects that increase food security. Income is used to pay
bank debt and thus avoid loss of land, to purchase the co-operative’s own mill,
and to increase the quality of the coffee. For example, PRODECOOP, based in
Esteli, Nicaragua, was founded in 1993, has over 2,420 family members and has
undertaken projects such as building schools and healthcare centres as well as
training in production techniques and legal matters.xxxii
Fairtrade could
potentially represent all smallholder coffee farmers. However, at the moment demand from
Northern consumers is not yet high enough to support this, and FLO is not
signing up new farmers to the scheme until demand is sufficiently boosted. Many
of the farmers signed up to the Fairtrade scheme are only able to sell 10 per
cent of their coffee production at Fairtrade terms, so an increase in demand
can be met immediately, and new farmers could join the scheme as it grows.xxxiii
Buying Fairtrade coffee
is not only an ethical choice, but is also about quality. In an independent taste test carried
out by Which? Magazine in November 2000 on 10 roast and ground coffees,
two of the top five places, including first place, were awarded to Fairtrade
coffees.xxxiv Fairtrade coffee compares favourably to other high quality
coffees.
Buying Fairtrade coffee
is becoming easier all the time. Certified Fairtrade coffees are available in most UK
supermarkets and are being made available in some high street coffee shops.
Fairtrade currently accounts for about 1 per cent of instant coffee and 8 per
cent of roast and ground coffee sales in
supermarkets. No
supermarkets, with the exception of the Co-op, have made available a Fairtrade
own-brand coffee. Costa Coffee are selling a Fairtrade coffee supplied by Café
Direct, but could be doing more to promote it. Starbucks have made Fairtrade
coffee available in the US, but are not selling it in UK outlets and have not
yet made any commitment to do so. The Fairtrade Foundation point out that all
coffee roasters, however small, can source Fairtrade coffee from the
established UK-based traders that supply it. Fairtrade coffee could become a
significant force in the world’s market if demand for it continues to increase.
Increasing demand for
Fairtrade coffee is absolutely crucial to making it a stronger option more able
to include more farmers. It is encouraging that the trend is already in that direction; the
demand for Fairtrade coffee has increased 47 per cent per year for the past 5
years.
Stop GM coffee in its
tracks – buy Fairtrade
Opposing GM coffee and
buying Fairtrade means everybody wins.
ActionAid makes the
following recommendations:
Companies and others
developing GM coffee should:
– stop development of GM
coffee;
– restrict work on GURTs
until control mechanisms have been established and impact assessments have
been carried out;
-- cease applying for and
surrender all claims to patents on coffee.
Coffee retailers
(including supermarkets and high street coffee shops) should:
– pledge that they will not
stock or sell GM coffee;
– offer at least one
Fairtrade line as a permanent part of their business;
for their crops.
Governments are urged
to:
– ban Terminator Technology
and deny requests to field test other GURTs until impact assessments
have been conducted and
controls have been initiated; – eliminate tariff escalation on coffee and other
products of importance to
developing countries.
Members of the public
can easily help smallholder coffee farmers make a decent living and provide for
their families. You
can express you opposition to GM coffee and its impact on smallholder farmers
to grocery stores, coffee shops and other retailers.
You can tell ICTI that
consumers do not want GM coffee. You can urge companies that sell coffee to
develop and enforce practices which help ensure that smallholder coffee farmers
get a reasonable price for their crops. You can help raise demand and
strengthen the Fairtrade network by choosing to buy certified Fairtrade coffee.
You can use the ActionAid
campaigning materials enclosed with this report to get you started. Please
visit the ActionAid website at www.actionaid.org for additional action
materials, ideas and campaign updates.
--------------------------------------------------
ActionAid is a unique
partnership of people who are fighting for a better world – a world without
poverty
ActionAid UK
Hamlyn House
Macdonald Road
London N19 5PG
United Kingdom
Telephone
++44(0)20 7561 7561
Facsimile
++44(0)20 7272 0899
E-Mail
mail@actionaid.org.uk
Website
www.actionaid.org
International
Head Office
London
Asia Regional Office
Bangalore
Africa Regional Office
Harare
Founder
Cecil Jackson Cole
Chairman
Ken Burnett
Chief Executive
Salil Shetty
Patron
HRH The Prince of Wales
ActionAid is a registered
charity No 274467
Company registered
Limited by guarantee
Registered Office at
London address
i Fairtrade Foundation
(1997) Spilling the beans. Fairtrade Foundation London, UK.
ii Ibid.
iii Ayuk, ET, Duguma,B,
Franzel,S, Kengue, J, Mollet, M, TikiManga, T, Zenkeng, P (1999) Forest
Ecology and Management,
113(1):1-9
iv Shiemno et al (1996) in
Ayuk, ET, Duguma, B, Franzel, S, Kengue, J, Mollet, M, TikiManga, T,
Zenkeng,P (1999) Forest
Ecology and Management, 113(1):1-9
v Interview with Robin
Jenkins, Independent researcher, farmer and writer for GRAIN, (2000).
vi International Coffee
Organisation website: www.ico.org
vii Organic Consumers
Association, Biodemocracy News Issue 32, March 2001.
viii Interview by John
Madeley, February 2001.
ix Interview by John
Madeley, March 2001.
x According to an Oxfam
publication, The Coffee market: a background study, the percentage of the
world price received by
small-scale growers varies from 35 to 70 per cent. In practice, however, poorer
growers in a weak
bargaining position may receive less.
xi Interview by John
Madeley, March 2001.
xii Interview by John
Madeley, March 2001.
xiii Fairtrade Foundation.
xiv Information supplied by
ACPC, January 2001.
xv International Coffee
Organisation estimate, January 2001.
xvi Financial Times, 20
April 2001 and Independent on Sunday, 22 April 2001
xvii Perfecto, I, Rice,
R.A., Greenburg, R., Van der Voort, M.E., (1996) Bioscience 46(8):5980608.
xviii Patent number US
5,874,269, WO9806852.
xix RAFI (1999) Terminator
Two-years Later. Rural Advancment Foundation International, Ontario,
Canada
xx RAFI (2000) RAFI
Communiqué, Suicide Seeds, Rural Advancement Foundation International,
Ontario, Canada
xxi RAFI (1999) Terminator
Two-years Later. Rural Advancment Foundation International, Ontario,
Canada
xxii COP5 cops out. RAFI
News Release, 20th June 2000.
xxiii
UNEP/CBD/SBSTTA/4/9/Rev.1, 17 May 1999, p14
xxiv Interview with John
Stiles (2000).
xxv Stiles J., 20th May
1999. Wayne Brown Institute's Investors Choice conference, Hawaii.
xxvi "Ongoing crises
in Ethiopia are threatening our daily cup", New Scientist, 24 June 2000.
xxvii ActionAid, Interview
by Katie Anderson, January 2000.
xxviii Michael
Chossudovsky, "IMF-World Bank policies and the Rwandan holocaust",
Third World
Network Features, 26
January 1995.
xxix Interview with Robin
Jenkins (2000).
xxx RAFI (2000) RAFI
Communiqué, Suicide Seeds, Rural Advancement Foundation International,
Ontario, Canada.
xxxi ActionAid, Interview
by Eve Mitchell, January 2001.
xxxii NACLA, Justice and
Java: Coffee in a Fairtrade Market, September/October 2000
xxxiii ActionAid, Interview
of Ian Bretman of Fairtrade Foundation, April 2001.
xxxiv ActionAid, Interview
of John Madeley, April 2001. Editrix – Eve Mitchell. Research and Editing –
John Madeley. Research –
Sophie Powell, Hugh Warwick, Viola Sampson and Katie Anderson.
Design – Middleton Design
Associates, London.
Genetic Use Restriction Technology
(Article Insert)
GM ripening-control coffee
is an example of a genetic use restriction technology, known as GURTs – a type
of genetic modification used to control a plant’s normal traits, or functions,
such as sprouting, flowering and ripening. GURTs plants have a normal trait
switched off and require the application of a chemical to trigger a genetic
‘on’ switch to make the function appear again. Without the chemical the trait
does not appear.
The potential of these
technologies is vast and serious, yet such research is all but unregulated.
Canada-based Rural Advancement Foundation International (RAFI) have even found
several patents for genetic switches that actually weaken plants’
natural resistance to pests and diseases – chemicals need to be applied to turn
the plants’ natural resistance back on.xix The implications for such
capability, and potential abuse of it, are ominous. International opposition to
GURTs is growing, especially ‘Terminator Technology’, which drives plants to
produce sterile seeds. These so-called ‘suicide’ seeds prevent seed saving – a
vital practice relied upon by around 1.4 billion people worldwide.
Pro-Terminator advocates claim they need to ‘protect’ the interests of patent
holders. However the GURTs threat to food security and biodiversity have led
governments, the Director General of the United Nations (UN) Food and
Agriculture Organisation, scientists and non-governmental organisations to call
for a ban on Terminator.xx xxi
Intense pressure from
industry lobbyists and the US and Canadian governments block and weaken
attempts to control GURTs. For example, the May 2000 meeting of the Conference
of the Parties to the UN Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) recommended
that ‘such technologies should not be approved for field testing until
appropriate, authorized and strictly controlled scientific assessments…[on]
their ecological and socio-economic impacts and any adverse effects for
biological diversity, food security and human health have been carried out in a
transparent manner and the conditions for their safe and beneficial use
validated.’ xxii The US government is expected to oppose this move even though
it is not a party to the convention and refuses to become one. The US
government is well known to block proposals that threaten the interests of its
biotechnology industry, and that industry hopes to commercialise GURTs in
signatory countries.
Campaigners call all GURTs
‘Traitor Technologies’. GURTs increase the profits of big companies by making
farmers dependent on buying new seed and the ‘on’ chemicals they sell that
farmers need to harvest their crop. They remove control for farming from
farmers and give it to GM seed and chemical companies.
The UN Convention on
Biological Diversity agrees:
‘The greatest potential
risks to food security associated with the wide adoption of V-GURTs may be the
increased dependence on seed production and distribution by a few commercial
suppliers and the vulnerability of such supply to disruption, either civil or
environmental.’ Xxiii