Coffee Facts: Next to military arms and oil, coffee is the largest commodity based industry in the world. It has an annual sales volume of over $10 billion. It is consumed by 65% of North Americans and is the 2nd most popular drink in the world next to tap water¹! Here are some interesting coffee facts:

• Coffee is grown in 50 countries around the world and is the principal commercial crop of over a dozen countries, half of which earn 25% to 50% of foreign exchange revenue from coffee exports.
• More than 10 billion pounds of coffee beans are grown per year, providing more than 20 million jobs.
• Coffee is indigenous to Ethiopia and was most likely discovered as a food before it became a drink. The most popular legend of how coffee was discovered involves an Abyssinian goat herder named Kaldi. Kaldi awoke one night to find his goats dancing around a tree speckled with red cherries. When he tasted one of the cherries, he too started dancing with his goats. It is more likely however, that wandering Ethiopian tribesmen used coffee as a food supplement by squishing the coffee cherries and eating them for nourishment as needed. Later, the cherries were soaked in water to make a drink, but it is not thought that hot water was used until the Arabs discovered how to boil water in 1000 A.D.
• Coffee was believed to have medicinal properties. Avicenna, an Islamic physician and philosopher of the eleventh century, said of coffee: "It fortifies the members, it cleans the skin and dries up the humidities that are under it, and gives an excellent smell to all the body."

The North American Coffee Market: North American coffee consumption is growing by 2.5% a year. In the United States, total sales of coffee in 1994 were approximately $7.5 billion, with specialty coffee representing approximately 33% or $2.5 billion of that. Organic specialty coffee sales were estimated at $150 to $200 million. Specialty coffee is, however, the fastest growing segment of the coffee market. Since 1987, the number of coffeehouses in North America has increased from 1,400 to over 10,000. Better taste is the primary reason for its popularity. In Canada, half of Canadians drink coffee every day, three or four times a day. Only 55% of North American consumption is roasted and ground coffee, while a full 45% is still instant, indicating the huge potential for gourmet coffee growth.

Coffee Trends: While coffee consumption worldwide is actually declining slightly, the market for two types of coffee - gourmet and organic - continues to rise.

• Gourmet Coffee: Gourmet coffee is made up of high quality Arabica beans. The gourmet coffee industry started in the early 1960s and has grown to $5 billion at the turn of the century. The majority of this growth can be attributed to a general trend toward quality in the market.
• Organic Coffee: Organic coffee is coffee that has been produced without the use of synthetic fertilizers, pesticides, insecticides, or other harmful chemicals that threaten the long range sustainability of soils, ecosystems, and groundwater supplies. As the demand from consumers for environmentally friendly products and practices has increased, organic sales from 1992 to 1997 grew from 1% to 2% of the overall coffee market to as much as 8% and has continued to rise since. A Stanford University Study has found that 66% of consumers are willing to pay more for a company's products and services if they believe the company is environmentally and socially responsible.²

In spite of these trends, the following disturbing facts are still true:

• 95% of the coffee sold on the market is 100% stale³.
• millions of coffee farmers live at or below the poverty line due to unfair trading practices⁴.
• technified coffee production is the 2nd largest cause of Rainforest destruction⁵.
• technified coffees are the 2nd most heavily pesticide sprayed crop in the world⁶.
• over 75% of the coffee consumed in North America is grown on these technified coffee farms⁷.

Fortunately, the two newest trends in the coffee industry along with the move to organic coffees make efforts to lessen these problems. They are fair trade and fresh roasting.

What is Fair Trade?: Fair trade refers to a revolutionary economic system that directly benefits poor coffee producers in southern countries. In this system, coffee companies commit to buying coffee only from small coffee farmers who have organized themselves into democratic co-ops. These co-ops sell their coffee collectively and collectively utilize profits to benefit their communities. The co-op coffee price per pound is guaranteed by the company purchasing the coffee. This eliminates the rapid and sometimes catastrophic fluctuations in the world price of coffee on small producers. Fair trade coffee also eliminates middlemen and "coyotes" that often take advantage of coffee farmers by charging excessive fees for transportation and shipping. The fair trade system has been part of the European coffee industry for over a decade, yet Canada has barely been introduced to the concept. In the last few years, however, the fair trade coffee industry in Canada has been growing considerably. Transfair Canada is the Canadian branch of Transfair International that regulates this industry by acting as a third party monitor giving credibility and consumer confidence to products that carry the Transfair label. For more information, see Transfair's website at www.transfair.ca.

Fresh Roasting: As the demand for a higher quality cup of coffee increases, it is only natural that consumers begin looking for a fresher product. Only in the last couple of years have a few coffee companies began addressing the freshness issue by guaranteeing a maximum shelf life of their product. This is not wide spread at this point, however. Our company, Equator Coffee Roasters, is one of the few that offers weekly delivery of coffee guaranteeing freshness. We can expect to see in short order, an increase in this service and the number of cafés with in-store roasters.