Cooperative Power

Co-ops are powerful organizational structures. By nature, co-ops form when people get together to meet a need they share that’s not being met. Members define the need and organize their own solutions, often using a combination of their own skills, labor, time, and capital. In the case of Organic BioRevolution, the supply chain from farm to shopping basket is completely cooperative. Small-scale farmers collectively work together as a co-op to cultivate and process coffee to export. Equal Exchange—a worker cooperative—sources, imports, and roasts the coffee. Trading as one co-op to another, Equal Exchange threads values into business, creating atypical terms that favor small farmers instead of marginalizing them. They pay a higher price to farmers to support organic cultivation, quality premiums, and added social premiums that benefit the farmer co-op and the surrounding community, with projects typically chosen by the farmer members.

As the middle co-op in this supply chain, Equal Exchange in turn sells roasted, organic coffee to our food co-op, working to build relationships with our store and community, just as they do with the farmer co-ops. Our trade relationship with them underscores personal connections, transparency, information-sharing, and a commitment to taking actions that build an alternative, better food system. 

Through these relationships and products, our supply chain is a beautiful and uncommon one, which is co-op to co-op to co-op. It’s a connection that is not just a simple straight line, but more like a network, with Equal Exchange connecting us not just to one farmer co-op but rather with dozens of farmer co-ops. Because each of those co-ops is owned by dozens or hundreds of individual members, our store’s membership is connected to hundreds of farmer co-op members. 

But there’s more! Because Organic BioRevolution is a coffee that is only sold to food co-ops in the US, this connection extends to dozens of food co-ops in various states and communities in the US, and by extension, on to their hundreds or thousands of members and shoppers.

A seemingly simple bag of coffee in truth connects thousands of cooperative members and allies. A purchase of this product could be considered both a spiritual vote for a cooperative movement and also a concrete economic action, directing dollars in support of the organizations who are committed to living out the cooperative ideals in practice.

Environmental Innovation

The coffee farmer co-ops in this supply chain *also* buck conventional norms in terms of farming ethos. In sharp contrast to conventional farming, with a typically extractive mentality, Equal Exchange’s farmer co-op partners are committed to organic, restorative practices. These farmers reject chemical inputs and instead work with natural resources to preserve ecosystems, enhance productivity and quality, and build healthy, resilient farms. There’s a real energy and creativity that permeates this work, of regular problem-solving and invention.

In 4 decades of partnership with small-scale farmers, Equal Exchange saw the increasing need to support farmers in addressing environmental challenges. Climate change has hoisted upon producers the need to adapt almost constantly. Organic BioRevolution is responding to that need in a unique way. For every pound of Organic BioRevolution coffee sold, Equal Exchange contributes 50 cents to a fund dedicated to environmental innovation projects led by farmer co-ops. Because of the support of co-op shoppers in the US, this fund has channeled over $100,000 to support coffee farmers, specifically in their innovative efforts at environmental resilience. 

In line with the fundamental cooperative spirit of members identifying needs and solving problems themselves, these BioRevolution funds have fueled farmer-led exchanges, bringing farmers across borders together to share ideas, best practices, and inspiration. One influential project includes building living fertilizers. Instead of using a fertilizer that is simply a final end nutrient that a soil needs, these “biofertilizers” are alive, thoughtfully constructed from collecting “good” bacteria and fungi from nearby forests, to reseed farm soils with local compatible inputs. These living fertilizers increase coffee plant productivity and quality, and can strengthen the plant’s immune system to better ward off disease and pests. 

One of the newer ideas that farmers are experimenting with using the BioRevolution funds for is beekeeping. Farmers are incorporating a native stingless bee, the Melipona, into their organic farming strategies. The results are positively compounding: the populations of this native species are rebounding; their natural activities increase the pollination and therefore productivity of the coffee plants; their impact, of course, extends beyond just coffee: these pollinators help all manner of plants and crops thrive, which helps both the humans and the other fauna in these communities. The Meliponas also create a super high-quality honey, which farmers can use in their own traditional medicine practices as well as sell locally, adding an additional income stream. The farmers’ commitment to organic practices, in turn, is a meaningful benefit to these bee populations. Chemical fertilizers and pesticides are a threat to bees and other pollinators; sustainable, organic, innovative farming models allow for a more reciprocal relationship with pollinators (as well as so many other species!). Plant productivity and pollinator populations are not pitted against each other, but rather can benefit each other.

For more information on living soil, coffee, and beekeeping, and impact stories in the farmers’ own words, visit this Organic BioRevolution webpage. Purchase Organic BioRevolution to fuel the co-op to co-op to co-op connection, and to keep the impact and innovation flowing.

Images courtesy of Equal Exchange