Countdown to a Green Valentine’s Day – Day 9

Posted by A. Caleb Hartley on February 5th, 2008 filed in food and drink

What’s the first thing that happens on Valentine’s Day, if you’re doing it right (right meaning how I would do it)?

Breakfast in bed for your Valentine, of course!

Did you know that coffee is one of the most intensively farmed, potentially damaging products on Earth?  Not only can it be terrible for the environment, but socially, it has been keeping the poor poor while “Big Coffee” reaps the profits.

So when you are choosing the coffee to bring to your Valentine in a little over a week when you bring him/her breakfast in bed, think “organic,” “fair trade,” and “shade grown.”

Conventional coffee is raised in a complete monoculture – it’s called “full sun” coffee, and it doesn’t allow for any biodiversity (meaning animals and other critters are eradicated for the sake of the highest yield of coffee possible).  It also is often grown in clearcut areas that used to be forest.

“Shade Grown” coffee, on the other hand, is grown <wait for it> in the shade.  Meaning that forests are not clear-cut to make room for the coffee plants, and that biodiversity is allowed to flourish.  Many species of birds call shade grown coffee plantations home.

Organic means what it says – essentially that no pesticides or chemicals are used to grow the coffee beans.  If you want to know requirements to be called organic, click here.

Fair trade also means what it says, but begs further explanation, I think.  Fair Trade is essentially an agreement between producers of a product and the retailers or buyers of a product to pay a “fair” price for the product.  The goal is for the producers to earn a living wage for growing or producing the product, while still allowing the retailers a fair profit for it as well.  It’s a way, especially for third world countries (where most of our coffee comes from), to help themselves out of poverty, and an example of what corporations are really in existence for – which is to help people (not just stockholders).

But I digress.

Some coffees are organic but not fair trade or shade grown.  Some are fair trade but not organic.  Et cetera, et cetera.  The goal is to find coffee that is all three – so here are a few options that fit the bill:

• Cafe Campesino
• Cafe Humana
• Caffe Ibis
• Cafe Fair
• Grounds for Change
• Higher Ground Roasters

There are more where these came from, and there are plenty of options between “triple certified” (fair trade, organic, shade grown) and “conventional” coffees to choose from.  The important thing is that, as with everything we do, we choose consciously and know what we are buying.

Especially for those whom we love.

Namaste,
A. Caleb Hartley

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Do you do breakfast in bed for your Valentine? Will you be buying “triple certified” coffee this year? If you can’t sleep from your caffeine buzz – answer these questions in the comments!

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