Students continue battle for fair trade

By Gina Belmonte

One year after switching to Barefoot Coffee Roasters coffee, the battle for fair trade coffee on campus remains unfinished.

A handful of students and university staff members are trying to change that.

Last January's partnership between Bon Appetit and Barefoot, a Bay Area fair trade coffee supplier, brought 100 percent fair trade coffee to Mission Bakery. But not all coffee on campus is fair trade, a common misconception, said Campus Minister Matt Smith. Coffee consumed in Market Square and used in university-catered events remains non-fair trade.

Smith and sophomore Anne Murphy-Hagan, leader of Santa Clarans for Social Justice, are working together to research Pura Vida, a company that deals the fair trade liquid coffee concentrate required to brew coffee for mass numbers. Because of their efforts, Bon Appetit General Assistant Manager Jason Landau plans to meet with a Pura Vida representative to discuss fair trade options next week.

"If we do manage to integrate the concentrate into Bon Appetit, it would be huge," said Murphy-Hagan.

Fair trade coffee ensures fair prices with a floor wage, paying growers five cents above the market rate with a minimum of $1.26 per pound (and more if organic), while ensuring safe working conditions and living wages, as well as environmental sustainability, according to Transfair USA, the nation's certifier of fair trade products.

"Currently, the coffee used in catering remains non-fair trade because it consists of a liquid concentrate provided by only two companies in the nation, neither of which is fair trade," said Landau.

Fair trade advocates on campus must locate product dealers and prove the switch to fair trade to be financially feasible for Bon Appetit, requiring plenty of research and hard work, said Anne Thomas, senior and co-founder of the Fair Trade Coalition on campus.

Nearby universities have found their own ways to serve only fair trade coffee.

At Stanford University, dining services offer 100 percent fair trade coffee, except for commercial cafés around campus, like Peet's coffee. Stanford also uses 100 percent fair trade obtained from Starbucks for catered events. Stanford pays a higher price for fair trade coffee concentrate used in catering because Starbucks imports it from other countries at higher costs, said Erin Gaines, sustainable foods coordinator for Stanford's dining services.

The University of California, Santa Cruz, is in direct collaboration with growers in other countries, and pays $3.75 per pound of coffee compared to the floor wage of $1.26. Because UC Santa Cruz is sponsored by the Community Agroecology Network, it can afford the extra cost, said Scott Berlin, director of the dining and hospitalities department at UC Santa Cruz.

"However, importing products from other countries conflicts with Bon Appetit's sustainability pledge to keep the smallest carbon footprint possible by decreasing transportation and minimizing carbon dioxide emissions," said Landau. Santa Clara students would have to propose a more local dealer.

"We just need to bring it to the table," said Landau about presenting demands in committee meetings of administrators, Bon Appetit representatives and students. As long as students provide local dealers and prove that the switch to fair trade is financially feasible, Landau is open to their proposals.

"I'm willing to look at all this stuff. Bon Appetit is really supportive of it. I would never discourage anyone from pushing for it," said Landau.

Whether there is anyone left to push for more demands is now the new challenge.

"Once Barefoot stepped on campus, the Fair Trade Coalition movement began to show signs of disbandment and disorientation just as it required more dedication to follow through on its petition to attain more fair trade products, including bananas, rice and chocolate," said Murphy-Hagan.

"Once we got coffee, we were having a hard time establishing a direction to look at again," said Murphy-Hagan. "We'd have to reeducate ourselves all over again. Before, everyone had been informed on coffee, and now it's like starting over from square one."

Perpetuating the disorientation and dissolution, influential members graduated and others left to study abroad, said coalition member sophomore Brad Thoreson.

Despite the coalition's dissolution, Thoreson said students in his dorm have talked about fair trade and shown plenty of interest. Murphy-Hagan said she is hoping that those abroad who "have had a huge, broad and global perspective" will make a contribution to the torpid movement.

Currently, there are no formal plans to revitalize the movement, said Thomas, save a collaborative effort with sophomore Courtney Blann, a member of the Green Club.

Blann is planning to publicize fair trade and test student knowledge through a distribution of surveys this upcoming spring as a part of her research project for SLURP, the Sustainable Living Undergraduate Research Project, based out of Swig Residence Hall.

Although not many students are actively petitioning for fair trade, the administration isn't standing still on the issue, said Jane Barrantes, assistant vice president of auxiliary services.

The dining services contract committee, comprised of Bon Appetit representatives, students and members of the administration, meets every two weeks to look at a range of issues from different options for food containers, food products, delivery services or sustainability practices. Students are welcome to raise issues of concern at any time, said Barrantes.

As far as fair trade goes, there is no preferable alternative for catering at the moment, but that doesn't mean one doesn't exist, said Barrantes.

The dining services committee will have to look at the quality of the proposed item using a blind taste test and evaluate the delivery schedule, the availability of the item to satisfy quantity demands and cost differences, along with possibilities of financial repercussions such as price increase, said Barrantes.

The fair trade movement's resuscitation rests with "students that want this and are ready to do actually a lot of work and research to see if it is a viable option to have fair trade chocolate, bananas and rice," said Thomas.

The SLURP project is a step to test the waters, and try to bring the publicity back, said Blann.

"Hopefully it'll wake up the movement in the spring," she said.

E-mail GBelmonte@scu.edu.