Issue link: https://read.dmtmag.com/i/491368
STiR tea & coffee industry international 17 "The Bioterrorism Act happened after 9-11," said Hermida. "All importers of food had to make the government aware that they were importing food. You had record keeping require- ments and a requirement for facility registration – all food facilities in the US are required to register with the FDA." The Bioterrorism Act required a one-time registration, she said, and "these new regulations impose other obligations to comply with rules. For example you will now have to re-regis- ter every two years. Registration is the hook in making the new preventative control rules apply – the statute's preventative control rules cover the process of roasting and regulate warehouses where coffee is stored. The foreign supplier verification rules cover bringing coffee into the country." In the worst case, NCA's request for the exemption of green coffee from the produce safety aspects of the rule will be rejected and the industry will find itself in a "Twilight Zone" where an unprocessed agricultural product is being treated as a manufactured product. "FSMA essentially will place good agricultural practice standards on green coffee as an agricultural product in the event that the FDA does not designate green coffee beans as exempt," says Don Pisano – the vp and secretary at coffee importer American Coffee Corporation. Failure to exempt green coffee would reflect a failure on the part of regulators to understand the industry's inner-work- ings. These tensions are evident in the FSMA's proposed regulations. "We want to achieve the goals of the Food Safety Modern- ization Act but to do that, we need the local mill managers to understand, and in fact embrace, the minimum requirements demanded for exports to the USA," said Pisano. "In order to achieve the objective of improving food safety, one would think that it is more important that the production guidelines be published in the language of the facility operators than us here in the US An English translation would be required under the current wording," says Pisano. Blind spots such as translating the rules into the language of coffee processors in the producing countries is an example of FSMA's Achilles heel, explains Pisano. "It will be quite a challenge for the FDA to enforce compliance on a global scale, but their lack of capacity will not excuse anyone from complying with the regulations," says Pisano. He prefers industry self-regulation. "The industry Safe food handling overseas and in the U.S. is the goal. Transparency Transparency has been great for our credibility within our industry and with our customers, according to Kim Elena Ionescu, coffee buyer and sustainability manager at Counter Culture Coffee. "Publicly sharing detailed information about the prices we pay for coffee and the relationships we have with suppliers allows us to paint a much more nuanced picture for our customers of the hard work we do than a simple base price could," she said. "Likewise, revealing shortcomings as well as successes in our progress toward our sustainability goals demonstrates our accountability and trustworthiness," writes Ionescu. Durham, N.C.-based Counter Culture Coffee, founded by Brett Smith in 1995, is a pioneer in developing the easily monitored supply chain legislators envision in their attempt to modernize America's food safety regulations. The Food Safety Modernization Act, currently in its final stages of review, places on US importers the responsibility for guaranteeing safe food. This requires close coordination with coffee growers and processors on a global scale. Coffee beans are sourced as directly as possible from farmers and co-ops in celebration of the people and cultures that create them, writes Smith who lists as core values the ideal of coffee perfection, real sustainability, and cutting-edge education throughout the supply chain. Counter Culture's roster of coffees reflect each coffee's diverse traditions and origins and include single-origin, espresso, microlots, blends and decaf coffee sourced from Africa, the Americas, Asia and the Pacific. Each coffee's packaging proudly identifies the farm or co-op's name, writes Smith. He describes a pragmatic model of environmental, social, and fiscal sustainability, "resulting from strong relationships with the farmers and communities who create their coffees." Growers are encouraged to practice organic agriculture on their farms – 85% of the coffee purchased is certified organic -- and they are constantly working to increase that percentage, according to Smith. Ionescu oversees several sustainability programs including Save Our Soil — a two-year campaign that aims to raise awareness about the widespread degradation of soil health; Sustaining Educational and Environmental Development at Source (SEEDS) — a program created to structure and define the company's monetary contributions to projects benefitting their coffee-producing partners and families; a Sustainability Scorecard to promote healthy coffee farms and Direct Trade Certification — a third-party certified direct trade standard for sustainability, fairness, quality, and transparency in the coffee chain. Direct collaboration allows Counter Culture to work side-by-side with farmers to improve quality, encourage ecologically responsible cultivation methods, assess social practices and working conditions, and learn more about the cultures and people who produce great coffee, said Ionescu. Learn more at www.counterculturecoffee.com