Coffee

Researchers have shown that coffee plants are sprayed with more pesticides than any other commercial agriculture crop.  These days, many consumers are demanding that the food they consume is organic.  Yet many people don’t realize that the coffee they are drinking contains many harmful substances.  Conventional coffee is routinely doused with pesticides, herbicides, and synthetic fertilizers.  These chemicals work their way into the beans themselves and, ultimately into your body.

Luckily, these days the consumer has a choice between buying the conventional, pesticide-ridden coffee, or an organic alternative.  Organic certifying organizations do a terrific job of ensuring that farmers meet strict guidelines when they grow coffee on their farms.  

Consumers can buy a wide range of organic coffee products, including beans from over 40 different countries in the world to decaffeinated coffee, to flavored and instant coffees.  Products that carry the USDA Organic seal need to contain at least 95% organic ingredients.  Most of them are in fact 100%, since coffee is a complete, natural product.  If you are purchasing an organic bottled coffee drink, everything in it must be certified organic, including the sugar, dairy products, etc.   

Organic coffee is already thriving in the world.  It is estimated that North America alone consumes 85% of the coffee produced throughout the world.  In 2008, 81 million pounds of organic coffee was imported into the United States and Canada.  This may sound like a lot, but it only accounts for 3% of the total coffee consumed in North America.  The trend is on the rise though, as organic coffee is one of the fastest growing segments in the beverage industry.  It has a phenomenal 35% growth rate, which far outpaces that of conventional coffee.  This impressive growth has definitely caught the attention of coffee shops and supermarkets, where organic coffee is steadily pushing conventional coffee off the shelves.

Is organic coffee worth the extra cost?  

The answer is definitely yes.  Coffee prices are so deflated these days that it only costs a few pennies to make a cup of coffee at home.  You can buy a pack of quality organic coffee for only one or two bucks more than regular coffee these days and that works out to about a cent increase per cup.  Everybody wins when you purchase organic coffee.  You get better coffee without the pesticides.  The farmer gets a little more income to support his family, and the ground the coffee is grown on isn’t sprayed with toxic chemicals.  Now that is definitely worth a penny more per cup.

Electric coffee machines are great for making organic coffee. Use a single serve coffee maker for making a perfect cup of organic coffee.

Author: Chad Damon
Article Source: EzineArticles.com
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Fair trade coffee sometimes is misunderstood, but it is quite simple. Fair trade coffee is coffee that is produced differently. They still use the finest quality of coffees, but there is something special and unique about it. Fair trade coffee ensures that the people who are working in the coffee industry are treated fairly. The United States consumes an extremely large amount of coffee. It is important to think about the people around the world who are harvesting and producing the coffee. The coffee drinkers of the United States often only think about the price and place of their coffee and do not think about the production, harvest, and shipment of this fine product.

Many of the people who work within the coffee plantations are treated very poorly. The coffee that is labeled as Fair Trade has standards for the workers. There are very specific rights of the workers. The criteria and requirements of the workers are held to this standard and that the workers receive appropriate compensation. This organization has the objective of helping the coffee drinkers in the world to purchase and brew coffee where the working conditions are sufficient for the employees. The focus on the organization is to ensure that socially and economically, the coffee field employees are not being exploited.

Many coffee fields have long work days involving unfair conditions and for very little pay. Companies who treat their workers in this fashion should not be compensated by people buying their product. Fair Trade has a definite certification process and through the labeling of the products lets the rest of the world know that this coffee was harvested under the best conditions for the workers. It is the same as not purchasing clothing that was produced under sweatshop conditions.

Some of these coffee fields should be considered “sweat shops in the field.” There are farmers who own small coffee plantations that are not treated fairly either. The companies tend to offer them little compensation for their coffee. This leaves the farmer being exploited. The farmers often end up in poverty. This is unfair to the farmers who have the desired product.

The people who love coffee should think twice before buying coffee that is not Fair Trade certified. Many people who find that they are looking into Fair Trade coffee have found that there are many suppliers with very reasonable prices. There are several Fair Trade coffee websites and one brand that is common is Dean’s Bean which is a morning brew. The cost difference between ordering online and buying from the grocery store is minimal. It is a great feeling for the people who do purchase off of the websites that each is doing their part to support the Fair Trade coffee industry. It makes every cup of espresso or cappuccino more enjoyable knowing that you are doing something special for the workers in the world.

Vince Paxton’s articles are found on lots of web pages related to brewmaster coffee maker. You might see his comments on grind and brew coffee machines over at http://www.coffee-espresso-maker-tips.com/grind-and-brew-coffee-makers.html and different sources for grind and brew coffee machines knowledge.

Author: Vince L. Paxton
Article Source: EzineArticles.com
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As the coffee industry shifts toward fair trade practices and organic certification, more farmers are switching to organic and sustainable practices. But, what does that mean, and how does it affect the actual coffee? For answers to these questions and tips on where you can find gourmet organic coffee, keep reading.

What Does Organic Mean?

Organic coffee typically indicates it has been certified by the USDA and meets their stringent growing and harvesting standards for organic certification. Therefore, coffee that has been certified as organic has been farmed using methods that have a minimal impact on the environment and little to no reliance on chemical or unnatural methods.

Because coffee is harvested as a seed, buying organic has little-to-no health effects for the consumer. However, purchasing an organic coffee bean means you’re supporting environmentally friendly and sustainable farming methods.

Ethical or Fair Trade Purchasing

Fair trade certification focuses on the labor practices of the coffee farmer and manufacturer. By purchasing fair trade coffee, you’re supporting a trade standard that gives small-industry grower co-ops a standard price for their coffee.

While fair trade doesn’t carry the same environmental standards as organic certification, they do ban the use of GMOs (genetically modified organisms) and most pesticides.

Who Makes Organic Coffee?

Green Mountain Coffee Company (http://www.greenmountaincoffee.com)

The Green Mountain Coffee Company is based out of Vermont and is one of the country’s largest organic and fair trade coffee suppliers. They currently do the bulk of their business as a supplier for office and workplace coffee needs, including K-Cups and instant coffee machines.

Gloria Jean’s Coffee (http://www.gloriajeanscoffees.com.au)

As a roaster and supplier of 100 percent organic, fair trade coffee, this Australian coffee roaster was awarded the Corporate Green Globe Award by the prestigious Rainforest Alliance.

They sell a range of coffees and roasts while fulfilling their commitment to ethical environmental and social business practices.

Jim’s Organic Coffee (http://www.jimsorganiccoffee.com)

Jim’s Organic Coffee makes a range of blends and roasts that are certified organic and fair trade. The company also sells a Rainforest blend that is shade grown and certified by the Rainforest Alliance. This means the farming methods used to cultivate the coffee don’t destroy natural habitats or the existing rainforest ecosystem around the plantation.

Starbucks

Starbucks, a major coffee retailer all over the world, carries three kinds of organic coffee. They stock their Shade Grown Mexican, Organic Serena Blend and their own Organic Sumatra-Peru blend.

For additional informative details on coffee and enticing flavors that explode your taste buds, please visit http://www.coffeetryst.com – a popular site with insights on coffee options, such as flavored decaf coffee, gourmet coffee gift baskets, and many more!

Author: Wesley Johnson
Article Source: EzineArticles.com
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A 2008 glance at Kona coffee retail prices shows options from $7 to 45 per pound. Contrary to the headline this actually sounds like a rather wide range where every market segment should be able to get their respective luxury-gourmet-coffee experience.

Yet if one subtracts all the products coat-tailing on the Kona name (e.g. ‘Kona Blend, ‘Kona Style’, ‘Kona Roast’) the range is getting much narrower. Nothing below $ 19.99 per pound, which appears somewhat genuine is to be found. If any other specifics like ‘Organic’ or ‘Extra Fancy’ are being added the prices are going quickly towards the $30 mark and above. Yet in supermarkets one can get for five bucks a wide variety of ordinary coffees and sale signs galore in the respective aisles. So who is getting rich here? And where is the discount stuff?

Let’s take a closer look of what Kona coffee actually is. The fabled Kona coffee belt stretches for 20 miles with only 2 miles width through the districts of North and South Kona on the Big Island of Hawaii, USA. Ideal coffee growing conditions produce a very unique, highly aromatic, mellow, yet limited annual crop of the fabled ‘kona typica’ beans. Mostly small family farms line the two roads winding along the fertile slopes of the active volcanoes Hualalai and Mauna Kea. The verdant green scenery with the blue hues of the Pacific below is occasionally interrupted by the signs of coffee processors trying to entice the local farmers to sell them their freshly picked coffee cherries: ‘$1.60 CASH!’ or ‘WEEKLY: $1.55′ or ‘BUYING CHERRY-Always Highest Prices!’. (1 lb roasted coffee needs a 7.4 lbs of coffee cherry). Also, once the harvest comes to an end, ‘BUYING PARCHMENT’ banners will flap in the gentle ocean breeze. What’s called ‘parchment’ is the now pulped and dried coffee, still in a thin membrane covering the green bean, which will fetch a price in the range of $7.50 – $8.50 per pound.

And that’s the key to understanding the 100% Kona coffee’s economics: Every local Kona coffee farmer has the chance to sell their crop! No additional work as pulping, drying, storing, milling, sorting, roasting, packaging, labeling, marketing goes into it. Many choose to do so, as labor costs in Hawaii are at a premium and housing for low wage workers is nearly impossible to find on the island. The actual Kona Coffee Belt land is too steep and rocky to navigate with machinery and hard human labor is needed to plant, grow and harvest.

Most farm parcels are only of 3 – 5 acres average size and are capable of producing 20 – 40,000 pound of coffee cherry. Once picking costs are subtracted (50 cent per pound) the annual monies earned can be considered only an additional income. So farmers have their unpaid families and friends pitching in during picking season and then the numbers look somewhat better. Yet so far no one got rich farming Kona coffee – it still is a labor of passion similar to an old fashioned vintners’ backbreaking daily chores. And passion it is when a few of these traditional family farmers in the age of the internet are able to bring their product direct to the customers: No middlemen, no processors, no pooling of various farms, no store chains or roasters between the consumer and them. Even that for the farmers to process, package, ship, advertise, et al raises will their profits only marginal, it guarantees them independence. It’s added value for both parties, as customers know exactly where the beans come from and the farmer is able to care and quality-control the coffee from seed to cup.

The main factors driving the price of genuine Kona coffee are therefore: Kona as a limited growing region for a superb tasting product requiring intense hand labor, coupled with a steadfast national and international consumer demand that guarantees virtually no surpluses or discounted volumes of Kona coffee to be moved.

But with many folks never having experienced what a real handcrafted Kona coffee tastes like, the profit margin between the ‘commodity’ coffees and the rare 100% Kona coffee is too tempting for many roasters. The growing market of single origin, single estate coffees – as a Kona coffee should be labeled – is flooded with impostor coffee brands. So please do your research and don’t always believe what’s written on the bag when buying Kona coffee. Especially when the deal sounds too good to be true or it tastes like generic coffee, it is most likely that those beans haven’t seen Hawaii at all.

See many pictures and read more of how a small farm produces delicious, affordable 100% Kona coffee: http://www.bluehorsekona.com/ (low end pricing)

Life seen through the eyes of a little Hawaiian girl growing up on a genuine small coffee farm in Kona: http://www.athenaofhawaii.com/ (moderate pricing; celebrity clientele; presented in handcrafted wooden gift boxes and unique tapa cloth pouches)

Author: Joaquin Delanuit
Article Source: EzineArticles.com
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What actually makes a Kona coffee farmer, who are they, why are they doing it, or just for the mental exercise: Could I too become a filthy rich, days-in-the-sun, surfing, shooting-the-breeze Hawaiian coffee farmer? This is a highly subjective, behind the scenes explanation of the most pressing question folks seems to have on their minds when they meet one of us coffee dudes. So for the sake of it, let’s categorize:

Cherry farms

are often held by the same family over three or four generations. These farms originated to provide additional income to the day jobs working the sugar cane fields in the 19th century. The high number of children and grandparents enabled the owners to do the unpaid hard coffee field work in the mornings, evenings and Sunday’s. Most Kona coffee is grown in the vicinity of family farmer’s residences; planted between rocks in irregular patterns, ranging from 100 to 1,000 trees per acre, often interspersed with other crops and some shade trees. Nearly all is sold as freshly picked coffee cherries to large processors, who also throw in a few bags of free fertilizer. The parcels range between 1 to 5 acres and are often leased in 40 year terms. This is and always has been the backbone of the Kona coffee industry. None of the farmers has to worry too much about government inspections regarding pesticide or herbicide usage, or coffee quality standards. The cheap lease of the land, which requires some agricultural practices to be obtained, justifies the small profit. Living and housing in Hawaii is expensive and the rural lifestyle eases the financial burden a bit. Most cherry farmers have a Japanese, Philippine or Hawaiian background and reside in the South Kona district. Age group: 50 – 90, 2 to 3 family generations under one roof. Many are members of the Kona Pacific Farmers Coop and not linked to any farmers organization. No web presence or farm tours offered.

Coffee Plantations 

in Kona are increasing in size, but there are only a few names in this category. All are owned by corporations or individuals with financial backing from the mainland. Their sizes range from 20 to 60 acres, and often contain other outlying parcels. In this production system recommended seedlings are used, the rocky land is being bulldozed, row planting, proper cover crops, mulching, manuring, weeding, and pruning methods are practiced. Nearly all use chemical fertilizers and herbicides as they are purely profit driven. Their coffees are always inspected and certified by the State. Yet most of their harvested coffees end up as highly profitable “10% Kona Blends” to duped tourists, who believe this coffee being pure Kona beans. The rest is sold to green coffee brokers in Japan and the US mainland. In addition to their own production they buy from smaller farms freshly picked coffee cherries at a fluctuating per pound price. They also process and grade coffee for farmers lacking the required big equipment. When buying from them always look for their expensive private labels, otherwise you’ll get the coffee pooled from many farms. Traditionally these large plantations in Hawaii went bust in recessions because of their high overheads. Cherry farmers may not get paid by them on time, but can i.e. hibernate through the current recession by simply neglecting their orchard for a season or two. Owners and managers are nearly all long time Caucasian residents of Hawaii, who are experienced with the local political culture. They organize in the Hawaii Coffee Association and Hawaii Coffee Grower’s Association to maintain the faulty legal status of the Kona Blend laws. Age group: 35 to 65; ‘good old boys’ networkers; SCAA members and exhibitors; all offer guided farm tours, farm stores, and professional websites. Their Kona coffees and Kona Blends have a strong presence in US mainland and Hawaiian stores.

Gentlemen farms

or “Snowbird farms” grow coffee on their properties as a hobby, as a tax incentive or because a vacation property is zoned as ‘agricultural’. One can completely relinquish the actual work to one of the larger plantations, who then in turn provide some roasted coffee upon request just in case the owner wants to sell a few bags under his/her own label. These types of farms are not really meant to be profitable but this doesn’t indicate if their coffees are good, bad or excellent. Some are organically cultivated. Some even sell their well-cared for coffee below costs. The owners have other sources of income and only reside part time in Kona. Under US tax law a property qualifies as a ‘farm’ when generating more than $1,000 in sales p.a. Gentlemen farmers are mostly Caucasians who strife for living a calm, easy Hawaiian life and have a story to tell when asked for what they are doing all day long. Geographically in the North Kona district centered around Holualoa. The 55 to 80 year old group consists of retired, married couples, single women. They have no professional affiliation or only nominally memberships at the Kona Coffee Council and the Kona Coffee Farmers Association. Some have websites and generally no farm tours are offered by them.

Boutique farms 

are yet another category but constitute the fastest growing segment. The vertical integration of the growing, processing and direct marketing to the customer and owning all means of production is essential. A small profit margin is indeed possible but it needs a multidisciplinary approach by the owners to keep any outsourcing to a bare minimum. About a quarter of them practice organic farming and they are environmentally concerned. Yet the combination of advancing age, hard physical labor and lack of computer literacy are challenging for many. But also big egos nurtured in prior high flying professions stand in their way: farming makes you humble but not instantaneously. A number of these farms default during the current recession, because their owners overlooked that equipment needs to amortize and public awareness of Kona coffee was always low. Building a solid customer base for a farm takes approximately 5 years. Learning the ins and outs of coffee farming about 3 years+. This group of farmers sees the faulty Kona Blend law as the largest stumbling block to a higher price for Kona coffee. Yet they oppose quality control and state inspections of their product, which doesn’t fly with the government. Owners are mostly mainland Caucasian and are sometimes married into Hawaiian families with various ethnic backgrounds. One can meet a colorful assortment of the human species in this group: The aging hippie, the retired colonel, the liberal professor, the activist lawyer, the Silicon Valley mini tycoon. They organize occasionally and challenge the legal status quo of the legislature. Age group: 40 to 75, couples, gay couples, single women, single guys. Affiliation: Kona Coffee Farmers Association or none. Mostly homemade web stores, shop presence in a few Hawaiian stores, farm tours offered upon requests.

There you have it. None of this background info indicates that a particular Kona coffee tastes better than the other! As long as it’s not a ‘blend’ or fake of course. The border lines between the categories are also not so well defined as one farm can be a ’boutique’ but also offers processing. Or it could appear like a large plantation with managers and all, but is held afloat by the partnership income of a big time law office in L.A. Or a fourth generation Japanese cherry farm made it successfully into the cyberage with a dazzling website.

Kona coffee beans grow regardless and despite of the local politicking on their behalf. A coffee tree doesn’t judge its farmer by skin color, age, sexual orientation, political affiliation or prior profession. Just if it gets its leaves properly tickled from time to time…

Joachim always tries to tickle the leaves of the BLUE HORSE KONA COFFEE trees the way they like it. This ancient Polynesian farm land in South Kona was developed from pure cherry farming into a boutique/family farm, but also offers wet processing and sun drying to neighbor farms.

http://www.bluehorsekona.com

Author: Joachim Oster
Article Source: EzineArticles.com
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