September 12th, 2007
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In the end, coffee farmers don't really get very much money for their goods. If you're curious, the website for Black Gold has a simple coffee price calculator that displays what portion of your coffee purchase ends up in the hands of the farmers and how much the middlemen retain. The disparity is jarring.
Whereas co-ops help an individual coffee farmer to improve his or her way of life, the industrial scale farm is the opposite. The main goal of industrial farms is to provide lower costs of coffee with high levels of efficiency in production. This results in cheaper prices for the buyers, but at a high cost: the welfare of the individual farmer. To compete with the cheaper prices offered by industrial farms, co-ops lower their own prices for the sake of generating revenue for their members.
Page 6 of 12
- The Black Gold Companion Guide
- The Motivations Behind Brewing Up Black Gold
- The Motivations Behind... Part 2
- The Price of Black Gold
- Setting the Price... Part 2
- Setting the Price... Part 3
- The Reality of Plummeting Coffee Prices: The Double Entendre
- The Reality of Plummeting Coffee Prices... Part 2
- A Caffeinated Nation
- Starbucks: The Unintended Target
- Starbucks... Part 2
- Conclusions
The film follows the life of hopeful co-op representative, Tadesse Meskela, on his emotional mission to fight for the meager livliehood of his coffee farmers. Deeply compelling, Black Gold has moved thousands of critics and moviegoers alike.
This film will challenge you to twice when you buy your next cup of coffee.
