A Day in the Life of a Coffee Cooperative COA students get first-hand lesson in international commodity production by Kati Freedman ’05 SAN LUCAS TOLIMAN, Guatemala—For months now, the eight students in College of the Atlantic’s inaugural Guatemala program have been immersed in the life of this land. We have felt the weight of people’s faith in patron saints as we carried their images on our shoulders, moving to the rhythm of a religious procession in which we were honored to partake. We have explored learning the Kaqchikel language, allowing us to walk through doors we never thought we could open. Yet our mission to bridge theoretical and practical learning can best be represented by one day spent with a commonly consumed product: coffee. Though we all arrived with some understanding of international commodity markets and their impact on those who labor in them, it took a mountain, a mission, and a man named Hector to Shade-grown coffee in the bag. Top row: Amanda Muscat ’06, Galen really drive the lesson home. Ballentine ’08, Mauro Carballo ’07, Katarina Jurikova ’08, Simon The day began with a tour of Ija’tz (proMichaud ’08, Grace Grinager ’08. Bottom row: COA historian Todd nounced “ee-hots”), a workers’ cooperative locat- Little-Siebold, Hannah Semler ’08 and Ana Maria Rey Martinez ’08. Photo by Kati Freedman ’05. ed in San Lucas Toliman, a small town on Lake Atitlan across from the tourist hub Panajachel. The orgaon coffee alone, even fair trade coffee. As Hector nization’s mission is to perform all the tasks along the explained, people cannot live off of coffee in San coffee production chain, right up to selling its beans on Lucas Toliman, they all have second jobs as carpenthe international fair trade organic market, with the goal ters, construction workers and other positions. This of ensuring a living wage for its members. isn’t surprising, given that a fair trade coffee picker We started the climb at midmorning with the idea earns about three dollars per hundred pounds of that we would be harvesting organic shade-grown cofcoffee, about the maximum yield of one person in a fee, without knowing what that would entail. The steep day. About half that would go towards the tortillas hike proved to be fairly strenuous; as we arrived at the necessary to feed an average-sized family, leaving plot we were to harvest, we began to wonder what that little for medicine or education. walk must mean for someone who does it every day. We descended the mountain, each of us carrying The coffee came in two varieties, one red and one about ten pounds of coffee, slipping on the steep yellow, both brilliantly colored and similar in size and slopes, exhausted from the heat and the harvest. As shape to the cranberry. Hector, our guide, divided us men began to pass us carrying one hundred pounds into pairs and told us to go down each row, one person on their backs, supported only by a strap on their foreon either side of each plant, picking all of the ripe heads, we came an inch closer to understanding how berries and placing them in the grain bags that we had much inequality there is in the coffee industry, how tied around our waists. A small child would come much the culinary privilege of the north shapes it and through later to get any berries we missed. how fair trade can be a step toward solving the probWe picked for several hours, a task that proved to be lem. Being at the top of the coffee production chain, more difficult than it first appeared, at least for us. The as consumers of this labor-intensive product, we were easiest plants to harvest were ones that were abundant beginning to see how much work goes into one cup with fruit; plants with scarce berries required a meticuof coffee. We had already learned how our sips of lous search through the thick leaves to find just a few. coffee intimately linked us to the people that grow it, Our impatience with the scarce plants quickly led to our obliging us to consume responsibly. At Ija’tz we met buddy system falling apart—but we had the privilege those people, sealing our commitment. of being choosy, of skipping plants, of taking breaks. We were only students in the field; we were not there to earn a Kati Freedman ’05 is spending this winter working as living or feed a family. It quickly became clear that those program assistant to COA’s 2006 Guatemala Program. two goals are not easy ones to achieve
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