Among the coffee drinkers, the average consumption is about 3 cups per day in the United States. About 50% of Americans over the age of 18 years drink coffee every day. This makes sense since everybody knows the impact coffee has on our lifestyles. Whenever a guest comes over our home, we offer them a glass of water or a cup of coffee. If you are a college student, which on-campus store is the busiest regardless of what time of day it is? If you guessed Starbucks, you are correct. What I am trying to stress is that coffee, whether you notice it or not, plays a pivotal role in our world. It is a universal drink that is loved and appreciated by everyone, whether you are in a café in Paris, France, or you are in your corporate office building kitchen. It is estimated that a whopping 1.6 billion cups of coffee are consumed in a single day throughout the world. Though it already plays a prominent role in our daily lives, it plays an even bigger role in the world’s international economy.

Many wonder where coffee originate from. The original coffee plant is said to have originated in Harar, and the native population is thought to be derived from Ethiopia with distinct nearby populations in Sudan and Kenya. Coffee was also primarily produced and consumed in the Islamic world and it is said that it played a pivotal role in religious practices. Coffee would soon make its impact on the European world as well. In what was original Ceylon (now Sri Lanka), the Dutch were cultivated coffee there for production. They would enslave the local population in islands of Java and Bali, to work on plantations to grow and harvest coffee. The French also grew coffee in what is today Haiti, also incorporating African slaves in the production process. Coffee production would go as far as to leading the way for the Atlantic slave trade. Already we see a correlation between the mass export of coffee and forcing slaves to grow and harvest the cash crop. Though slavery is abolished de jure in all countries today, there are still echoes of previous colonial relations and slavery, with businessmen in the South, in charge of plantations of coffee production for the consumers of the Northern half of the world.

In terms of development, coffee production contributed greatly in certain countries during different time periods. For example, in the 1920s, Columbia and Costa Rica saw significant development success, while Kenya and Cote d’Ivoire experienced their own growth in the 1960s and 1970s. One thing to point out is that coffee is produced in more than 50 countries in the Global South. Approximately 125 million people in the world depend on coffee for their daily lives. Coffee, for the most part, produced in countries such as Brazil, which is the leading coffee producer, meaning the majority of the world’s coffee, is produced by smallholder farmers. These said farmers continue to dominate coffee production in countries scattered across the Southern world, such as Colombia, Mexico and Costa Rica as well as in almost all African countries.

The International Coffee Agreement (ICA), first signed in 1962, insured that coffee prices would be maintained at a high rate and it kept these prices stable in the market using export quotas. It also aimed at controlling exporting quotas. After the ICA collapsed in 1989, coffee producers have since seen historically low prices in 2001 to 2005 and again in 2013. During this time, the world also experienced significantly higher levels of price volatility as well, connected not only to the end of the price stabilization mechanisms, but also to increased speculative activity. The 2006 documentary Black Gold depicts how coffee farmers in western Ethiopia struggle to live with the low prices and wages they receive for their hard work in producing coffee. Black Gold also illustrates how unequal the modern coffee industry has become, focusing on the concentration of powers between coffee producers and international traders. The documentary also highlights the lives of farmers, who are struggling to make ends meet with their low salary. In one scene, a group of farmers are seen to be praying together for higher prices for their coffee. In another scene, it shows how some farmers are completely ditching the production of coffee for other crops since the prices are so low and the competition is so high.

The production of coffee is stemmed from mainly underdeveloped countries like Ethiopia. For a three-dollar cup of coffee, a farmer typically makes only three cents. Factory workers and farmers that are essential to the production of coffee that gets exported from underdeveloped countries, earn less than half a dollar a day. These hardships are especially highlighted in the Black Gold documentary where farmers are barely getting by while having to produce millions of coffee beans for export. Most of these beans that are being farmed in these developing countries are being shipped out to the Western and developed world. Billions of dollars are being poured into the production and export of coffee but the people that are actually producing the beans are barely making it through with their salaries. There can be correlations made between the coffee production of today and the production of coffee of the past. As mentioned above, the businessmen and large companies that are responsible for the coffee export, run their businesses abroad, in mostly Southern countries that are impoverished. These businessmen target developing countries for the production for cheaper costs so that they can export and profit off of developed countries. I can’t help but draw similarities with the French Caribbean. Since the 1600s, all the way to the early 1800s, France had occupied islands of the Caribbean, importing slaves, to work on the fields for production of cash crops, like sugar, cocoa, etc. They exported most of the products from these Southern islands to the kingdoms of the North, where the businessmen made profit, while the slaves that actually did the real work, earned little to nothing. This similarities do not only branch out to France’s involvement in slavery, it also relates to other previous colonial powers.

When bringing up fair-trade commodities, you must incorporate coffee into the discussion. Coffee has proved to be the flagship factor for fair-trade commodities in the world. Coffee was the first product to be Fairtrade-certified and remains one of the largest. Other Fair-trade certified products include bananas and cocoa, which are also two of the largest alongside coffee. The United Kingdom is the largest Fairtrade market and coffee sales have continued to spike regardless of the impact of the economic recession. The Fair Trade was established with the intent of creating more ‘trading links’ between the producers of the South and the progressive and politically motivated in the North. It focused on the main principles of justice pertaining to society, equity, and sustainability. It also provided alternative trade movements.

Though Fairtrade was founded on the principles of equity and producer empowerment, there have been controversies involving the intent and actions of the powerful corporations that are involved through fair trade certifications. This is seen in coffee production, especially with the amount of coffee being exported compared to the amount the producers are getting in return. Large corporations are selling coffee throughout the world in large amounts, while the farmers and laborers that are actually getting their hands dirty to ensure the mobility of export are getting little to nothing in return for their hard work. Alternative Trade Organizations, or ATOs, have attempted in providing solutions to this problem as their aim involves improving producer knowledge and bargaining power so that these producers can get a better price for their work. The success in this initiative is still under construction as people involved in the production of coffee are still severely underpaid. Organizations, such as Cafédirect and Equal Exchange, not only commit to selling 100 percent Fairtrade certified products, they also work directly with organizations that produce to reinvest profits and improve quality.

Women are the main contributors to the coffee production in the African scene. While it is mainly men who are the owners of the land and the ones that retain control over the income from coffee production, women are responsible for the work related to production, like growing and harvesting the coffee. The men, who own the land, also dominate the decision-making processes at the household and corporate level. Women actually contribute to the labor associated with coffee more than men in Africa. They too struggle the decline coffee incomes and have a difficult time in sustaining the household. Not only do women face inequality in the cost for coffee, they also experience it with the Fairtrade-certified cooperative committee. Astonishingly, there have been no elected female members on the management committee. Fair Trade has stated that their aim is to address gender inequalities and to support empowerment for women.

An argument can be made that there needs to be more acknowledgement on existing gender norms, and they need to address it more since it is a barrier to women’s participation in Fairtrade and their ability to share in the gains. According to the article Women in the Coffee Industry: What You Should Know, published on the Perfect Daily Grind, it is said that “being both less represented in decision-making positions and receiving less of the income, [women] often do more daily work than their male counterparts.” This opens the discussion to another problem related to coffee and inequality. Women are heavily underrepresented in the decision-making sector, while most of the coffee is produced by women farmers. These women are already at a disadvantage because most cannot own lands or afford them in these countries because of price discrimination. These women also tend to make less than their male counterparts which is especially unfair since women tend to have more household expenses according to a survey published on the Perfect Daily Grind.

Millions of people around the world, depend on coffee to get through their daily activities. Whether you are on your way to work, getting ready for a morning workout, trying to stay up all night to study for that exam last minute, or just going to the local café with your best friend, coffee continues to impact the lives of many. It also impacts those that do not necessarily consume, but those who produce it as well. Though there are multiple ATOs that promise the fruits of equity, sustainability, and human rights, the people that are working on these vast coffee farms and factories are barely getting by with their low wages. Large corporations are profiting off of the coffee we drink, but the actual producers are struggling to keep up in their own lives. This needs to change. There is no place in any society for these severe inequal conditions where people are being discriminated against and not being able to get the money they deserve. The situation is complicated, there are many initiatives that promise that they are making an impact towards the right direction, but they are not. We need more regulations and restrictions on these large corporations exploiting their laborers for profit. Though coffee is one of the largest Fairtrade certified products in the world, it brings up a pivotal question that needs to be answered immediately. How “fair” is the production of coffee?