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EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
The demand for coffee ranks it as one of the highest-trade commodities in the world, second only to petroleum, and provides opportunities for work for struggling families in tropical climates in which coffee thrives. The coffee industry has produced two strikingly different paths of life - one of struggle for those that grow and harvest the crop to make a living and one of convenience and socialization for those that consume the product. However, there has been a push in the coffee culture of developed countries to bridge such discrepancies in quality of life between producers and consumer, evident in the dozens of variations of labels like fair trade and ethical sourcing.
Keywords: Fair Trade, Ethical Sourcing, Oromia Coffee Union, Direct Trade
INTRODUCTION
Jose Perez Vasquez is up at sunrise in Chiapas, Mexico to begin work for the day. He has already traveled several kilometers to get to his field of coffee trees, with no choice but to walk the distance as there is no method of transportation to get him to the fields to work. Jose put years of care and maintenance into his field of coffee trees before his crops reached maturation. It is the season for harvesting coffee beans, so Jose must pick the cherries off the tree to be collected in a large sack. This sack holds up to 60 kilos (over 100 pounds) of cherries to be seeded. Women and children who share the workload to contribute to their family income, all of whom take on specific roles to prepare the coffee beans to be exported for sale, join him. Farmers work until sundown, when they step back onto that several kilometers-long hike to return home to prepare for the next day of work.
Small-scale farmers throughout Central American countries like Colombia, Brazil, and Guatemala wake every morning to tend to acres of coffee beans to be harvested. Because the healthy growth and harvest of coffee requires a tropical climate, the production of coffee is a driving force in the economy of developing countries in Central and South America and parts of Africa. The demand for coffee ranks it as one of the highest-trade commodities in the world, second only to petroleum, and provides opportunities for work...