Guest blogger Matt Earley, of CRS Fair Trade coffee partner Just Coffee in Madison, WI, provides a different perspective on the various trading models, emphasizing transparency above all else.

When we talk about “fair trade”, it would make perfect sense to assume that we are speaking of a system that everyone agrees upon. And it is true that the ideals and beliefs behind fair trade are largely universal. The basic philosophy appreciates the fact that small-scale commodity producers, particularly in the global south, have long been underpaid and exploited in the global economy. However, the systems that have sprung up around the idea of guaranteeing producers better prices and more stable relationships have attacked this problem in surprisingly different ways.

Over the years systems and certifications that focus on the social conditions of producers and their communities have grown in popularity and prominence. There are many opinions about which of these systems can actually bring the most benefits to producers and to the coffee drinkers who choose to support these systems. And to most of us, it is very hard to tell which brings the most benefits based on the claims that companies using these systems make. So what is a conscious consumer to do?

Some of the more prominent systems within the coffee market are Mission-Based Fair Trade, Certified Fair Trade, and Direct Trade. Below I will give a brief outline of each of these approaches.

1) Mission-Based Fair Trade: Many mission-based fair traders see themselves as creating an alternative system that operates within, but at the same time against, the “free market”. These companies consider themselves to be “fair trade companies” as opposed to companies that sell some products that are fairly traded and some that are not. Many of these companies use FLO’s Fair Trade certification, but just as many do not. Many belong to fair trade networks such as the Fair Trade Federation or the World Fair Trade Organization. These companies and people are generally dedicated to knowing the people producing the products they sell and tend to identify fair trade as a social movement and not simply a system of minimum standards.

2) Fair Trade Certified: These companies who sell products that are certified by the Fair Trade Labeling Orgaization and their national intitatives. The companies using this scheme are not “certified”, but rather certain products that they sell are certified. There are many mission-based fair traders using the certification system as well, but there are many using the system that are not mission-based at all. Many of these are big businesses that sell only a portion of their products under fair trade terms, although in some cases this small percentage of overall product can represent huge numbers. These companies are generally not interested in the idea of creating a better overall model, but rather they recognize that by using the certification and its label they can tap into a fast-growing market segment. And some of these companies are shifting to selling more Fair Trade Certified products because it is proving to be profitable as well as “the right thing to do”.

3) Direct Trade: Recently covered well on the CRS Coffelands blog by CRS’s Michael Sheridan, Direct Traders share some of the base philosophies of mission-based fair traders and of companies carrying Fair Trade Certified products. Direct Traders also stress direct relationships with producers and paying farmers a higher price for their coffee. Instead of approaching producer challenges by addressing the politics of production and exportation, they stress producing high quality as the means for an individual farmer to procure a higher price for his or her beans. The companies that use this approach promote it as an alternative to Fair Trade that is based more on the traditional free trade model that stresses competition among farmers over systemic market change. They also buy coffee from large and small plantations where workers do not own the land as well as from cooperatives where producers own their plots. Mission-based FTer’s coffee and FTC products only come from small-producer co-ops.

With all of this information we can begin to debate which approach more closely meets our criteria as a conscious consumer. Is being 100% fair trade important to you? Is price-point your biggest issue? Are you a seeker of the highest quality small lots of coffee? These are all great points to discuss, but when we do so we skip over whether companies making ethically-based claims are giving us the total picture. Without one important lense, all of these approaches amount to little more than marketing-speak. The lense that we should seek out is transparency in business practices.

When all coffee companies (and other companies, for that matter) back up their claims by showing us their financial documents (contracts, P&Ls, etc) consumers can make informed decisions about what they want to buy. Making consumer decisions based on facts as opposed to marketing would allow us all to choose the model we want to support according to whether or not it actually meets our standards. That would be true economic democracy. With true financial transparency, all of us could decide on the true “fairness” of business practices based on hard information as opposed to smart marketing claims.

Most companies do not offer this type of information at this point in time, however it is our right as consumers to know what we support when we give them our money. Every time we spend money we are making a choice to support the business model of the company we purchase from, therefore we have the right and obligation to know what exactly we are paying for. When we ask businesses for transparency we are helping to build as better democratic economic model for all.