STiR coffee and tea magazine

42 STiR coffee and tea / Issue 3, 2017 (June/July) Groundwork bought its first AMUCC organic coffee in 2016. The roaster offers growers an interest-free revolving credit line $1 per pound bonus for exceptional micro-lots. Maria Cristina Potosi was the first recipient. left in charge of a business and household due to their husband's absence. In the six years since it was founded the group has grown to 190 members with a production of 450,000 kilos (7,500 bags) per year. Their story caught the attention of Groundwork Coffee, a roaster in Venice, Calif. Roasters there bought their first prize coffee, grown by Maria Cristina Potosi, a self-described 'enterprising woman' with 35 years experience produced a unique micro lot. "The half container (150 bags) I bought in 2016 from Maria sold quickly in our units," said Jeff Chean, Groundwork's chief coffee guy. Auctions and competitions have showcased coffee produced by smallholders for a decade or more, but the reality is far from the ideal. Differ- ent paths are considered and the Coffee Quality Institute suggested eight recommendations to ac- celerate gender equity in coffee value chains. It is a practical guide to inspire people to be powerful change agents. 1. Increase women's participation in training programs and revise training programs to be gen- der sensitive; 2. Develop a list of gender equity principles for coffee; 3. Improve women's access to credit and assets; 4. Achieve greater gender balance in leadership positions; 5. Support joint decision-making and ownership of income and resources at the household level; 6. Specifically source and market coffee from women producers and coffee produced under conditions of gender equity; 7. Invest in programs to reduce time pressures for women; 8. Continue to build understanding through research and measurement. This is a common theme but debates don't consider all women in the coffee industry. There is much more going on beyond farming realities. "As a coffee sensorial analyst, I study aromas and flavors," says Camila Arcanjo who works at the Coffee Industry Syndicate of São Paulo State (Sindicafé). "I also conduct workshops and ana- lyze coffee samples." These women are setting the pace in the sup- ply chain and they can be found in any segment. They are baristas, Q-graders, scientists, traders, coffee shops' owners and have an important role to assure that rural women will have consumers to sell their lots. Eliana Relvas has more than 20 years of experience and worked in different areas promoting coffee. Nowadays, the food engineer is responsible for buying large quantities of coffee monthly for a big supermarket chain in Brazil. "My job is to increase the awareness of quality coffee among regular consumers in order to promote and valo- rize the hard work of those on the farms. I am the link between rural and urban," said Relvas. Some companies promoted women to leader- ship roles long ago based on their skills and compe- tence. "Race, gender, and religious diversity in our staff is so normal that we do not even talk about," said Bourbon Specialty Coffee trader, Thiago Tro- vo. "This is part of our identity, our values." Among their rural partners, women are an in- herent part of the family-run business. "Our expe- rience shows that wives and daughters are more meticulous during very important phases to qual- ity, like post-harvesting," said Trovo. These little changes can be celebrated but there is much work to do towards interpersonal relationships. The struggles faced by women in urban areas can be subtle and issues with sexism and race must be considered to benefit the coffee chain. "When I get on the phone and customers hear my voice, the conversation changes, because they realize that I'm not a man," said Erin Meister of Café Imports. "How do you do business ef- fectively in an environment where you wonder if people treat you differently or talk to you differ- ently if they 'knew who you were'." The situation can be even more difficult for black women. "I've had people ask me if I 'even like cof- fee' in the middle of instructing a lab," said Tymika Lawrence of Genuine Origin. "Look around this room—how many black woman instructors do you see, how many black woman managers? If I didn't like coffee, do you think I could even be here? I've always had to reference my resume. People ask you to reach into your past and measure what I've done, and they don't even realize it. I have to casually drop my resume into conversations as a way of saying I'm a qualified coffee professional. I've had to qualify myself in every new coffee space, always."

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