Clearly lots of people do, otherwise you would have had no problem leaving your real name with that comment ;)

From World Visions website:

Often their children, even those as young as eight or nine, can be forced to go to work on the plantations to help their families produce a larger crop to make more money.

The situation is predicted to affect 125 million people, who may already be living below the poverty level, through unemployment, hunger and migration.

I guess when it comes down to it, I would never go out to coffee and not pay my bill, I would never shoplift from a store, I would never try and con anyone out of their money, it's just not right.  And so I also won't support third world farmers being ripped off by the western world markets, it's just not right.  It's that simple, really.

I totally agree with the caution that needs to be taken when it comes to schemes like fair trade, I did first and second year economics at uni, and its definitely not as simple as people think.  However I have read a lot about how fair trade works, and I am satisfied that it is giving the farmers a better deal.

The reason why fair trade works is because at its heart, it is putting western buyers into direct contact with farming cooperatives, so that the farmers have the chance to negotiate a fair price for their goods.  Also as part of the scheme, a "premium" is added to the price of the coffee, and this premium is put back into community projects.

Fair trade farmers are randomly auditted to ensure that they aren't employing slave labour, or abusing the system in anyway, and so are the community projects.

As far as the over supply is concerned, I'm don't think fair trade will negatively impact it.  What fair trade does effectively is to stop farmers from squeezing their pickers, or their own wages, in order to move the supply curve.  Hence the cost of producing coffee increases, and thus supply decreases, because if there is not enough demand to meet the supply, then some farmers will be forced to put their land to other uses.  It also should be noted that fair trade doesn't set a fixed price, just a price floor, which affects things roughly in a equivalent way to the minimum wage in Australia.  If demand for coffee goes up, because the buyers are in direct contact with the farmers, the farmers are able to sell the coffee at a higher rate, and they receive the profits.

Hi Kylie,

Yes, the original owners sold the Kent St cafe, but kept the original cafe (which is in Pyrmont), because they found running two too draining on their time.  They've switched blends, but according to their website, it's a Toby's Estate Fairtrade blend.  It seems at least some of Toby's Estates blends are Fairtrade, and they do boast the Fairtrade logo on their website.

I agree that since the Kent St cafe changed owners, the consistency has gone down.  I still go there every day because it's close and convenient to my work.

My opinion on coffees that claim to be ethical is that although there is no guarantee, as long as they are a small boutique roaster, they are probably ok.   On the other hand, if it's a mass supplier, then I'd be suspicious, as trading direct with many small farms is going to be very difficult to manage, that is, to ensure that they aren't being taken for a ride by the producers.  The larger the roaster, the more small farms they'll have to deal with, and therefore the easier it will be for those farms to use unethical practices like underpaying pickers or using forced child labor.  Fairtrade has an audit system, that while it's not perfect, it does give us some confidence, like minimum wage and employment laws in Australia give us confidence about products made in Australia.

Toby's Estate is not a small boutique roaster, so it would be interesting to see what if any processes they have in place to ensure that their producers are acting ethically too.

James,

Thank you. I searched google for "fair trade coffee Sydney", as I'm heading to Sydney later this week from Wellington and like you want to be able to choose to support a trading system that seeks give consumers the option to support more ethically traded goods.

Obviously at $2.50 for a coffee, retailers are not making a killing selling this  'premium' product.

If one wants to look at the issue of the oversupply of coffee, perhaps the focus should be more on the the investment the world's four largest coffee roasters made in establishing the coffee industry in Vietnam, (a climate suitable for growing only cheap low-grade beans to make inferior coffees)
http://www.coffeehabitat.com/2006/02/the_coffee_cris.html

I will be visiting pulse and if I find any more FT cafes will let you know....

Thanks for this - I  googled followng a program on ABC about the coffee growers (and a bunch of privileged pommy kids who were "experiencing" their way of life for 5 minutes) - anyway it woke me up (ahem) to the issue.  The little church cafe on Queens Square (between Philip and Macquarie) does Tobys Estate and the barista told me it's Fair Trade - $3.00 mind you, but you get a free biscuit along with your appeased conscience.

This is still second hit on a Google search for "fair trade coffee in Sydney CBD", so I thought I'd add a cafe that makes a good fair trade latte.

Live Organics in the MLC Centre (Martin Place) uses only fair trade coffee. They do a fine vege burger too.

Cheers