Wake Up and Smell the Coffee

What’s the big deal? It’s just a bag of coffee beans. Or is it? For some reason, I can’t bring myself to open and grind a small bag of coffee beans from Sumatra, Indonesia, somebody gave to me for Christmas. I like the “woodsy” flavor of Sumatra Mandheling. It’s a coffee that I drink only now and then. If I drank it every day, it might not be my favorite. If I drank a cup today, I think I would get shivers down my spine.

Just consider how far these beans had to come to end up in my kitchen. They were grown, according to Allegro Coffee, on small farms by Batak natives living near Lake Toba on the island of Sumatra. The company that distributes the beans is careful to advertise that it works with small farms there to reinforce the principles of fair trade and environmental sustainability.

Sometimes farmers can work with the environment. Other times, as with tsunamis, the environment works against them. “Despite its wealth of natural resources,” says the “Lonely Planet Guide to Indonesia,” “Sumatra is struggling with a failing economy. The northern province of Aceh is at the epicentre of separatist violence and the area has been hit by devastating earthquakes.” That was the truth before last week’s earthquake. Given the current crisis, I have to wonder how much worse things can get for the people who live in Indonesia.

Within hours of the earthquake and the tsunami that followed, coffee moguls in the United States began reacting. In Washington, Scott Merle of Batdorf and Bronson spoke to “The Olympian.” "I've been getting updates from contacts in Sumatra, and it's not real scary for coffee," he said. "That's mostly because of where it grows, in the highlands—not anywhere near the coast. We skirted having something bad happen in terms of coffee." Merle finished by acknowledging that his company had a four-month supply of beans stashed away.

Dean Cycon, a distributor of fair-trade organic coffee beans based in Massachusetts, offered a different reaction. His company newsletter announced, “Our farmers suffered tremendous property damage in the mountains, many houses collapsed and roads were destroyed. The coffee warehouse in Takengon was partially destroyed, but the resourceful farmers turned the rest of the warehouse into shelter for the homeless families.” Now if you visit an Internet store to purchase Dean’s Beans, you may also donate to a relief fund, with 100% going to the farmers who work for Cycon’s company.

I’m cynical, but I’m hopeful. I want to believe that coffee corporations are more worried about “their” indigenous farmers than they are the coffee beans. My own bag of coffee says, “Growers are paid a premium for triple-handsorting the beans to produce a consistently outstanding coffee.” “Premium” is relative. I’m hoping that people who regularly drink Sumatran coffee are making a run on the beans left on the market and that the corporations here give even more profits back to the communities than they now do. I’m hoping they’ll pay more for future bean crops than fair exchange.

The label on my bag of beans says that the coffee would taste best brewed prior to December 29, 2004, a date that came and went as I watched the world watching the tragedy unfolding in all those communities by the Indian Ocean. I guess that means I should grind the beans and drink my coffee, but I’m going to wait until I deserve a cup. I can’t imagine opening it soon. Whenever I look at this bag, I see hands picking and sorting these coffee beans. Three times.

Felicia Mitchell. First published in Washington County News (Abingdon, VA), 5 January 2005, p. A4. WCN is a publication of Media General Operations. Copyright 2005.