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Dean's Dispatch from Timor Leste
In March, Dean of member-roaster Dean's Beans ventured into relatively unchartered waters, to a country that few North Americans have heard of let alone bought coffee from! Coop Coffees been buying coffee from Cooperativa Cafe Timor since 2002. We all benefit when roasters, like Dean, take the initiative to organize and report a trip like this. Here is a clipping of his summary of the trip. Click on the link below for more!
In his own words...
"I was told that I was the first buyer ever to sleep in a coffee farmer's house, the first to hold meetings with farmers and ask their opinions. That's not hard to believe in a country so remote from our geography and most of our consciousness (do you know where Timor-Leste is?). The newest country on the planet only gained full independence in 2002, after centuries of Portuguese colonization, Japanese occupation and 
Indonesian military repression. Timor-Leste is struggling hard to forge its own path and create an economic base that can raise the living standards of some of Asia's poorest people. Coffee underpins the entire economy.
We have been buying coffee from Cooperative Cafe Timor (CCT) for eight years, but it is the only country we buy from that I had never visited. Nor did I know anybody who ever had. I had met with the Foreign Minister, UN Ambassador and Vice Prime Minister at various times in New York to discuss our approach to People-Centered Development and how that might be relevant to the coffee regions in Timor-Leste. For years we had been providing profit-sharing funds to the farmers for the purchase of medicine in the rural clinics constructed by CCT, and for the last two years supporting a small alternative food project called Gardeners of Eden. I had heard grumbling from some folks in the industry that the farmers weren't getting much money nor had much say in their cooperatives, contrary to the rules of Fair Trade. I didn't want to support something I didn't understand, or make representations about the lives of the farmers we bought from that weren't accurate. Since I was unaware of anyone in the coffee industry with first hand, on-the-ground knowledge of the situation, I had to check things out for myself.
My two weeks in Timor-Leste were the highest of highs and the lowest of lows, the wettest of wets and the hottest of hots. Each day brought new information, confusing and conflicting stories, canceled meetings, hope and heartbreak. On the surface, CCT is not structured like other Fair Trade cooperatives. The producer sub-coops do not appear as active as in other countries; some farmers say they don.t get as much information, technical or medical help from CCT as they want. Some said the money was just enough to get by, but not enough to improve their living standards. I was pressed by some folks I met- how can you support this when you know it isn.t really Fair Trade, regardless of approval of the international certification body FLO? Can you continue to buy in good faith and make representations that this is really fair to the farmers?"
To continue reading Dean's report of his intriguing visit, check out the Dean's Beans website...
