Effects of fair trade and organic certifications on small-scale coffee farmer households in Central America and Mexico

Renewable Agriculture and Food Systems

Volumn 25, Issue 3, 2010, Pages 236-251

  Méndez, V Ernesto ^a   Bacon, Christopher M ^b   Olson, Meryl ^a   Petchers, Seth ^c   Herrador, Doribel ^d   Carranza, Cecilia ^e   Trujillo, Laura ^f   Guadarrama Zugasti, Carlos ^f   Cordón, Antonio ^g   Mendoza, Angel ^g  

^a UNIVERSITY OF VERMONT   (United States)

^b UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA   (United States)

^c University of Barcelona ^*  (United States)

^d UNIVERSITY OF BARCELONA   (Spain)

^e Ministerio de Medio Ambiente y Recursos Naturales   (El Salvador)

^f UNIVERSIDAD AUTÓNOMA CHAPINGO   (Mexico)

^g Asociación CRECER   (Guatemala)

Author keywords

alternative markets; coffee crisis; farmer cooperatives; political ecology; rural livelihoods; sustainable coffee

Indexed keywords

AGRICULTURAL MARKET; CAPACITY BUILDING; CERTIFICATION; COFFEE; COOPERATIVE SECTOR; PARTNERSHIP APPROACH; POVERTY ALLEVIATION; PRICE DYNAMICS; RURAL DEVELOPMENT; RURAL ECONOMY; TRADE FLOW; TRADE PERFORMANCE;

CENTRAL AMERICA; MEXICO [NORTH AMERICA];

EID: 77958491227     PISSN: 17421705     EISSN: 17421713     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1017/S1742170510000268     Document Type: Article

References (89)

1. Gresser, C. and Tickell, S. 2002. Mugged: Poverty in Your Coffee Cup. Oxfam International, London, UK.
2. Lewin, B., Giovannucci, D., and Varangis, P. 2004. Coffee Markets: New Paradigms in Global Supply and Demand. World Bank, Washington, DC.
3. ICO. 2008. ICO indicator prices: monthly and annual averages. Available from: http://www.ico.org/prices/p2.htm (accessed 12 March 2008).
4. Petchers, S. and Harris, S. 2008. The roots of the coffee crisis. In C. Bacon, V.E. Méndez, S.R. Gliessman, D. Goodman, and J.A. Fox (eds). Confronting the Coffee Crisis: Fair Trade, Sustainable Livelihoods and Ecosystems in Mexico and Central America. MIT Press, Cambridge, MA.
5. Renard, M.C. and Pérez-Grovas, V. 2007. Fair Trade coffee in Mexico: at the center of the debates. In L.T. Raynolds, D.L. Murray, and J. Wilkinson (eds). Fair Trade: The Challenge of Transforming Globalization. Routledge, London and New York. p. 138-156.
6. Bacon, C.M., Méndez, V.E., Gliessman, S.R., Goodman, D., and Fox, J.A. (eds). 2008. Confronting the Coffee Crisis: Fair Trade, Sustainable Livelihoods and Ecosystems in Mexico and Central America. MIT Press, Cambridge, MA, USA.
7. Ponte, S. 2004. Standards and Sustainability in the Coffee Sector: A Global Value Chain Approach. IISD/UNCTAD, Winnipeg, Canada.
8. Raynolds, L.T., Murray, D., and Heller, A. 2007. Regulating sustainability in the coffee sector: a comparative analysis of third-party environmental and social certification initiatives. Agriculture and Human Values 24:147-163.
9. Murray, D., Raynolds, L.T., and Taylor, P.L. 2003. One Cup at a Time: Poverty Alleviation and Fair Trade Coffee in Latin America. Colorado State University, Fort Collins, CO, USA.
10. SCAA. 2008. What is specialty coffee? SCAA. Available from: http://www.scaa.org/what-is-specialty-coffee.asp
11. Courville, S. 2008. Organic and social certifications: recent developments from the global regulators. In C.M. Bacon, V.E. Mendez, S.R. Gliessman, D. Goodman, and J.A. Fox (eds). Confronting the Coffee Crisis: Fair Trade, Sustainable Livelihoods and Ecosystems in Mexico and Central America. MIT Press, Boston, MA. p. 289-310.
12. Goodman, D. 2003. The quality 'turn' and alternative food practices: reflections and agenda. Journal of Rural Studies 19:1-7.
13. Rice, R.A. 2001. Noble goals and challenging terrain: organic and fair trade coffee movements in the global marketplace. Journal of Agricultural and Environmental Ethics 14:39-66.
14. Liu, A. 2007. Road to the future: SCAA's path to sustainability leads to UN's Millennium Development Goals. The SCAA Chronicle Jan./Feb.:8-9.
15. World Bank. 2004. Executive summary and update of the original paper titled Varangis, P., B. Lewin, & D. Giovannucci (2003) Dealing with the coffee crisis in Central America: Impacts and strategies. World Bank Policy Research Working Paper. World Bank, Washington, DC.
16. Villalobos, A. and Giovanucci, D. 2006. Acelerando el crecimiento del café orgánico en el E.E.U.U. + Kafe Revista de Café Diferenciado (CIMS) 3:9.
17. IFOAM. 2008. Organic standards and certification. Available at Website http://www.ifoam.org/about-ifoam/standards/index. html (accessed 12 March 2008).
18. USDA. 2003. Organic certification/National Organic Program. Available from: http://www.usda.gov/wps/portal/!ut/p/-s.7-0- A/7-0-1OB?navid=ORGANIC- CERTIFICATIO&navtype= RT&parentnav=AGRICULTURE
19. Raynolds, L.T. 2004. The globalization of organic agro-food networks. World Development 32:725-743.
20. Yussefi, M., Willer, H., and Geier, B. 2004. Organic agriculture worldwide: still on the rise in 2004. Ecology and Farming (IFOAM) Jan.-April:12.
21. Kilian, B., Jones, C., Pratt, L., and Villalobos, A. 2006. Is sustainable agriculture a viable strategy to improve farm income in Central America? A case study on coffee. Journal of Business Research 59:322-330.
22. TransFair USA. 2005. 2004 Fair Trade coffee facts and figures. Available from: http://www.transfairusa.org/ (accessed 7 April 2007).
23. Bacon, C. 2005. Confronting the coffee crisis: can fair trade, organic and specialty coffees reduce small-scale farmer vulnerability in northern Nicaragua. World Development 33:497-511.
24. EFTA. 2003. The Fair Trade Yearbook: Challenges of Fair Trade 2001-2003. European Fair Trade Association, Maastricht.
25. Rowlands, J. 1997. Questioning Empowerment: Working with Women in Honduras. Humanities Press, Oxford.
26. FLO. 2004. Standards in general. Available from: http:// www.fairtrade.net/sites/standards/general.htm (accessed 8 August 2005).
27. Raynolds, L.T. 2009. Mainstreaming fair trade coffee: from partnership to traceability. World Development 37:1083-1093.
28. Greenberg, R., Bichier, P., Angon, A.C., and Reitsma, R. 1997. Bird populations in shade and sun coffee plantations in Central Guatemala. Conservation Biology 11:448-459.
29. Moguel, P. and Toledo, V.M. 1999. Biodiversity conservation in traditional coffee systems of Mexico. Conservation Biology 13:11-21.
30. Perfecto, I., Rice, R.A., Greenberg, R., and Vand der Voort, M.E. 1996. Shade coffee: a disappearing refuge for biodiversity. BioScience 46:598-609.
31. Rice, P.D. and McLean, J. 1999. Sustainable Coffee at the Crossroads. White Paper. Consumer's Choice Council, Washington, DC.
32. Giovannucci, D. 2001. Sustainable Coffee Survey of the North American Specialty Coffee Industry. Summit Foundation, Philadelphia, PA.
33. Mas, A.H. and Dietsch, T.V. 2003. An index of management intensity for coffee agroecosystems to evaluate butterfly species richness. Ecological Applications 13:1491-1501.
34. Mas, A.H. and Dietsch, T.V. 2004. Linking shade coffee certification to biodiversity conservation: butterflies and birds in Chiapas, Mexico. Ecological Applications 14:642-654.
35. Philpott, S.M., Bichier, P., Rice, R., and Greenberg, R. 2007. Field testing ecological and economic benefits of sustainable coffee certification: do organic and fair trade do enough? Conservation Biology 21:975-985.
36. Giovannucci, D. and Ponte, S. 2005. Standards as a new form of social contract? Sustainability initiatives in the coffee industry. Food Policy 30:284-301.
37. Raynolds, L., Murray, D., and Taylor, P.L. 2004. Fair Trade coffee: building producer capacity via global networks. Journal of International Development 16:1109-1121.
38. EUREPGAP. 2008. About EurepGap. EUREPGAP. Available from: http://www.eurep.org/Languages/English/about.html (accessed 12 March 2008).
39. SAI. 2008. Social Accountability International-SA8000 overview. Available from: http://www.sa-intl.org/ (accessed 12 March 2008).
40. Bray, D.B., Plaza-Sanchez, J.L., and Contreras-Murphy, E. 2002. Social dimensions of organic coffee production in Mexico: lessons for eco-labeling initiatives. Society and Natural Resources 15:429-446.
41. Jaffee, D. 2007. Brewing Justice: Fair Trade Coffee, Sustainability and Survival. University of California Press, Berkeley and Los Angeles.
42. Lewis, J. 2005. Strategies for Survival: Migration and Fair Trade-Organic Coffee Production in Oaxaca, Mexico. Working Paper 118. The Center for Comparative Immigration Studies (CCIS), University of California, San Diego, CA.
43. Martínez-Torres, M.E. 2005. Organic Coffee: Sustainable Development by Mayan Farmers. Ohio University Press, Athens, OH.
44. Mutersbaugh, T. 2002. The number is the beast: the political economy of organic coffee certification and producer unionism. Environment and Planning A 34:1165-1184.
45. Bacon, C.M. 2010. A spot of coffee in crisis: Nicaraguan smallholder cooperatives, Fair-Trade networks, and gendered empowerment. Latin American Perspectives 37:50-71.
46. Méndez, V.E. 2002. Fair Trade Networks in Two Coffee Cooperatives of Western El Salvador: An Analysis of Insertion Through a Second Level Organization. Case Study Prepared for the Project on "Poverty Alleviation Through Participation in Fair Trade Networks". Colorado State University, Fort Collins, CO.
47. Lyngbaek, A.E., Muschler, R.G., and Sinclair, F.L. 2001. Productivity and profitability of multistrata organic versus conventional coffee farms in Costa Rica. Agroforestry Systems 53:205-213.
48. Arnould, E.J., Plastina, A., and Ball, D. 2009. Does Fair Trade deliver on its core value proposition? Effects on income, educational attainment, and health in three countries. Journal of Public Policy and Marketing 28:186-201.
49. Ellis, F. 2000. Rural Livelihoods and Diversity in Developing Countries. Oxford University Press, Oxford.
50. Chambers, R. and Conway, G. 1992. Sustainable Rural Livelihoods: Practical Concepts for the 21st Century. Discussion Paper No. 220. Institute for Development Studies, Sussex, UK.
51. Bebbington, A.J. 1999. Capitals and capabilities: a framework for analyzing peasant viability, rural livelihoods and poverty. World Development 27:2021-2044.
52. Bebbington, A.J. and Batterbury, S.P.J. 2001. Transnational livelihoods and landscapes: political ecologies of globalization. Ecumene 8:369-380.
53. Gezon, L.L. and Paulson, S. 2004. Place, power, difference: multiscale research at the dawn of the twenty-first century. In S. Paulson and L.L. Gezon (eds). Political Ecology Across Spaces, Scales and Social Groups. Rutgers University Press, New Brunswick. p. 1-16.
54. Zimmerer, K.S. 2007. Agriculture, livelihoods, and globalization: the analysis of new trajectories (and avoidance of just-so stories) of human-environment change and conservation. Agriculture and Human Values 24:9-16.
55. Bryant, R.L. and Bailey, S. 1997. Third World Political Ecology. Routledge, London and New York.
56. Robbins, P. 2004. Political Ecology. Blackwell Publishing, Malden, MA.
57. Watts, M. and Peet, D. 2004. Liberating political ecology. In D. Peet and M. Watts (eds). Liberation Ecologies, 2nd ed. Routledge, London. p. 1-30.
58. Zimmerer, K.S. and Bassett, T.J. (eds). 2003. Political Ecology: An Integrative Approach to Geography and Environment-Development Studies. Guilford Publications, New York.
59. Gereffi, G., Humphrey, J., and Sturgeon, T. 2005. The governance of global value chains. Review of International Political Economy 12:78-104.
60. Goodman, D. 2008. The international coffee crisis: a review of the issues. In C.M. Bacon, V.E. Méndez, S.R. Gliessman, D. Goodman, and J.A. Fox (eds). Confronting the Coffee Crisis: Fair Trade, Sustainable Livelihoods and Ecosystems in Mexico and Central America. MIT Press, Cambridge, MA. p. 3-26.
61. Daviron, B. and Ponte, S. 2005. The Coffee Paradox: Global Markets, Commodity Trade and the Elusive Promise of Development. Zed Books, London.
62. Gereffi, G., Humphrey, J., Kaplinsky, R., and Sturgeon, T.J. 2001. Introduction: globalization, value chains and development. IDS Bulletin 32:1-12.
63. Pietrobelli, C. and Rabellotti, R. 2006. Upgrading to Compete: Global Value Chains, Clusters and SMEs in Latin America. Harvard University Press, Cambridge.
64. Talbot, J. 2004. Grounds for Agreement: The Political Economy of the Coffee Commodity Chain. Rowman and Littlefield, Lanham, MD.
65. Dorofeev, S. and Grant, P. 2006. Statistics for Real Life Sample Surveys: Non-simple-random Samples and Weighted Data. Cambridge University Press, London and New York.
66. Bacon, C., Méndez, V.E., and Brown, M. 2005. Participatory action-research and support for community development and conservation: examples from shade coffee landscapes of El Salvador and Nicaragua. Research Brief No. 6. Center for Agroecology and Sustainable Food Systems, University of California at Santa Cruz.
67. Butler, L.M., Dephelps, C., and Howell, R.E. 1995. Focus groups: a tool for understanding community perceptions and experiences. Western Regional Extension Publication Report No. WREP0128. Washington State University, Seattle, WA.
68. Stewart, D.W., Shamdasani, P.N., and Rook, D.W. 2006. Focus Groups: Theory and Practice. Sage, Thousand Oaks, London and New Delhi.
69. Raynolds, L.T., Murray, D.L., and Wilkinson, J. 2007. Fair Trade: The Challenge of Transforming Globalization. Routledge, London and New York.
70. Zar, J.H. 1999. Biostatistical Analysis. Prentice-Hall, Upper Saddle River, NJ.
71. Flores, M., Bratescu, A., Martínez, J.O., Oviedo, J.A., and Acosta, A. 2002. Centroamérica: el impacto de la caída de los precios del café. Serie de estudios y perspectivas † 9. CEPAL/ ECLAC, México, DF, México.
72. Van der Vossen, H.A.M. 2005. A critical analysis of the agronomic and economic sustainability of organic coffee production. Experimental Agriculture 41:449-473.
73. Bacon, C.M. 2006. Estudio de costos y propuesta de precios para sostener el café, las familias de productores, y organizaciones certificadas por Comercio Justo en América Latina y el Caribe. Report to the Coordinadora Latinoamericana y del Caribe de Pequeños Productores de Comercio Justo (CLAC).
74. Pinstrup-Andersen, P. 2009. Food security: definition and measurement. Food Security 1:5-7.
75. Maxwell, S. 1996. Food security: a post-modern perspective. Food Policy 21:155-170.
76. Massey, D., Durand, J., and Russell-Malone, N.J. 2002. Beyond Smoke and Mirrors: Mexican Immigration in an Era of Economic Integration. Sage Foundation, New York.
77. Lewis, J. and Runsten, D. 2008. Is Fair Trade-organic coffee sustainable in the face of migration? Evidence from a Oaxacan Community. Globalizations 5:275-290.
78. Bebbington, A. and Kothari, U. 2006. Transnational development networks. Environment and Planning A 38:849-866.
79. Méndez, V.E. 2003. Fair trade, social networks and rural livelihoods in small farmer coffee cooperatives of western El Salvador. Paper presented at the 2003 Meeting of the Latin American Studies Association (LASA), March 27-29, Dallas, TX.
80. Murray, D.L., Raynolds, L.T., and Taylor, P.L. 2006. The future of Fair Trade coffee: dilemmas facing Latin America's small-scale producers. Development in Practice 16:179-192.
81. Utting-Chamorro, K. 2005. Does fair trade make a difference? The case of small coffee producers in Nicaragua. Development in Practice 15:584-599.
82. Bebbington, A. 1996. Organizations and intensifications-campesino federations, rural livelihoods and agricultural technology in the Andes and Amazonia. World Development 24:1161-1177.
83. Taylor, P.L., Murray, D.L., and Raynolds, L.T. 2005. Keeping trade fair: governance challenges in the fair trade coffee initiative. Sustainable Development 13:199-208.
84. Fox, J. 1992. Democratic rural development: leadership accountability and regional peasant organizations. Development and Change 23:1-36.
85. Mutersbaugh, T. 2005. Just-in-space: Certified rural products, labor of quality, and regulatory spaces. Journal of Rural Studies 21:389-402.
86. Bacon, C.M., Méndez, V.E., and Fox, J.A. 2008. Cultivating sustainable coffee: persistent paradoxes. In C.M. Bacon, V.E. Méndez, S.R. Gliessman, D. Goodman, and J.A. Fox (eds). Confronting the Coffee Crisis: Fair Trade, Sustainable Livelihoods and Ecosystems in Mexico and Central America. MIT Press, Cambridge, MA. p. 337-372.
87. Bacon, C.M., Méndez, V.E., Flores Gomez, M.A., Stuart, D., and Díaz Flores, S.R. 2008. Are sustainable coffee certifications enough to secure farmer livelihoods? The millennium development goals and Nicaragua's Fair Trade cooperatives. Globalizations 5:259-274.
88. Méndez, V.E. 2008. Farmers' livelihoods and biodiversity conservation in a coffee landscape of El Salvador. In C. Bacon, V.E. Méndez, S.R. Gliessman, D. Goodman, and J.A. Fox (eds). Confronting the Coffee Crisis: Fair Trade, Sustainable Livelihoods and Ecosystems in Mexico and Central America. MIT Press, Cambridge, MA. p. 207-236.
89. Méndez, V.E. 2008. Certificaciones de cafe: Version Popular. Oxfam America, San Salvador, El Salvador.