How can I buy coffee beans directly from producers in Asia, Africa, or South America?
You can check the answer of the people under the question at Quora “how to buy coffee beans from farmers“
How can I buy coffee beans directly from producers in Asia, Africa, or South America?
You can check the answer of the people under the question at Quora “how to buy coffee beans from farmers“
Hi there,
Direct trade is great, by doing this you are an innovation leader. I am firmly convinced that the specialty coffee market is heading towards standardisation of direct trade models, many roasters are waiting on the right project that will make real direct trade easy.
I don’t know much about Asia or Africa, so I’ll talk for the South American region. Buying coffee directly from a farm or cooperative is in fact not a big deal, the problem will be to have it prepared and shipped to your country. This shipment will be made by middleman, there is no way to bypass logistics if you buy in a developing country and consume in North America or Europe.
Two steps are needed to buy your coffee directly:
Travel to the origin at the end of the harvest. Meet farmers and cup their coffee. Once you like it, you can buy it.
Find an importer in the country you want to consume and check if he can organise shipping for you. Usually importers are connected with exporters in many countries and they can manage logistics for you.
Sound easy right? But have a look at the following list before buying your flight ticket:
The coffee you decided to buy is ready for export? It passed through the mill already? Screen size is the right one already? Be aware that not all farms or co-ops have infrastructure to prepare coffee for shipping.
How was it sampled? It maybe good to ask a third party Q-grader to give his advice.
Your coffee won’t be a priority for the exporter or importer, they will ship it only once they have space in a container. While it will be waiting, make sure that it is stored in a safe place. Coffee can loose significant quality when not stored properly.
You negotiate your price in USD? Pesos? Reals? Currencies in developing countries fluctuates a lot, take this in account.
How and when do you pay your coffee? Directly at the farmer or once it arrived at your roastery? Do you have the capital to pay completely or do you need pre-financing?
How do you manage if the coffee loses quality during the shipping? Who will pay for it? Have a look at contracts, insurances and responsabilties.
Oh, I forgot, do you speak any Portuguese or Spanish? Maybe Swahili? Usually producer don’t speak so much english.
The list goes on. I don’t want to scare you in anyway, but those two simples steps listed above are hiding a lot of complexity. It is perfectly possible to do direct trade, many roaster are doing it already. It only requires some time to learn how it works, to create a network of trusted partners, etc.
I envision an internet platform where coffee roasters can contact producers, order samples, buy coffee with full price transparency and have an option to pay a bonus directly to the producer. But without having any burdens related to shipping or contract or pre-financing or …. or … or … Let see if it happens one day.
it is very good idea to buy direct from producer in any country ,my family in Thailand they coffee farm in the northern of Thailand ,i know how hard to work in farm ,mostly coffee in this country it from my tribe group ,i would like to help them and my family to selling in good price (fair with them) if you want help pleae contact me
Pachamama Coffee Cooperative http://pacha.coop is a coffee co-op owned by farmers in Mexico, Nicaragua, Guatemala, Peru, and Ethiopia. So when you buy coffee (green or roasted) from Pachamama, you really are buying it directly from the farmer.
While the regional selection is limited right now, it’s a company that’s growing and ultimately trying to build a better model to open up the global market for farmers. And it’s a good way to get started buying direct, without having to buy huge quantities or taking on too much risk.
Disclaimer: I work for Pachamama, mainly because I was interested in doing the same thing you are, and frustrated by the fact that it was such a difficult process. Good Luck!
My name is Napoleon. I’m from Guinea( Conakry) West Africa. It is easy to buy coffee beans from producers in my country Guinea, but the point is you need to be present or send someone to supervise your activities in guinea I think that will not be easy in the beginning due to lot of problems. In order to be sure that you can do very good business with me or in guinea, I would like to provide you 5 kg of organic coffee beans as sample for free to test if that is the quality you want for the next months . If you’re intersted I will bring you the quantity you want with very affordable price. With the time when confiance is established between you and me then you can visit there to see what is possible. I’m glad to be your next interlocutor to share our ideas. Thank you.
Good morning, my name is Juan Gabriel Forero Celis, my family has a coffee growing in Colombia (Supatá Cundinamarca) which is in production (20.000 plants). we believe that our coffee meets the criteria you seek. therefore I would like to make contact to start the selection process. thank you very much.
Eight O’Clock
We are Nasan Vietnam JSC, an experienced manufacturer and exporter in Vietnam.
Experience in the production, coffee plantation and export our coffee beans, we are knowing good name of Washed ARABICA Coffee.
Should you are interested, please feel free to contact us.
Kind Regards,
Peet’s
I am from Tanzania, I am a coffee farmer and I have robusta and arabica type of coffee.
If you want I can supply you directly with coffee.
My email : mway09@gmail.com
At Caffè de Aromi we do exactly this, however the regions we focus on are; Thailand, Laos, Indonesia, Cambodia, Vietnam and India.
We buy direct from the coffee farms and work directly with the farmers. Caffè de Aromi also supports and buys coffee from Indonesia, Brazil, Colombia and Guatemala.
We believe it’s important to give back what we use and to support the people who provide to us. This is why Caffè de Aromi is a direct trade coffee company detailing directly with the farmers. As such this goes far beyond what fair trade is, however it’s important to still support the process of fair trade. You can read more detail about Fair Trade, UTZ certification, Bird Friendly, Rain Forest Alliance and Organic Coffee here http://www.caffedearomi.com/organic-coffee
If you are interested to find out more about individual coffee farms in Asia, please contact us.
We also sell a range of whole bean and ground coffee and would be happy to discuss if you are interested to buy.
Visit our website at http://www.CaffeDeAromi.com for information on how we support coffee producers.
Kind Regards,
Caffè de Aromi
Thought I would just share an article about our model that was just published on the cover of the Sunday business New York Times. There are some errors on pricing and details left out on payment schedules but overall gives a sense of how we are changing things and you are buying directly from farmers: http://www.nytimes.com/2013/03/17/business/coffees-economics-rewritten-by-farmers.html?pagewanted=all
Check out CropToCup coffee. It’s an amazing little coffee company in Brooklyn that has a fantastic business model where they buy direct from specific farmers and pay them far beyond what Fair Trade Certified growers get, along with giving them technology so they can reach western markets themselves and get access to farming data, weather info, etc off the web. I was introduced to it by a friend of mine User who blogs on locavore food here in NYC and now sell it in my store and on my website.
For more info, check out their site http://croptocup.com/farmer_regional_profiles.php
Check out the NGO Community Cloud Forest Conservation http://cloudforestconservation.org/
They are doing amazing work directly with coffee growers in the cloud forest of Guatemala. You can buy whole bean premium coffee from local cooperatives through them.
Victor Allen’s
If you are interested in buying Indian Coffee (we grow Arabica Coffee) you can contact me. I have a plantation in Coorg, India.
Its easy as finding a direct link to the farmers through genuine persons/coperatives/organisations. I have direct connection to the best coffee farmers in Africa based in both Ethiopia and Kenya. My email is tikiteta0@gmail.com. Regards
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Check out the newly launched CoffeeCSA by the folks at Pachamama Coffee
http://www.coffeecsa.org/
Pachamama is a “farmer-owned” coffee brand, so a higher percentage of the coffee goes to the farmers (they own more parts of the supply chain).
NY Times – Community Agriculture Goes Global With Coffee
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/04/22/us/22bccoffee.html?_r=2
check it out i have a coffee from indonesia
http://www.javanegra.com
Ethical Coffee Chain does this. http://ethicalcoffee.co
It directly matches you (along with other coffee drinkers) with a single farm that you always get your coffee from, and then uses those coffee purchases to help improve conditions in that community, so you can follow the story of that farm as your coffee subscription makes a difference over time.
Our first farmer is Gus Santos and his family’s farm in Jinotega (northern Nicaragua). http://ethicalcoffee.co/gus We’re focusing on this region because of its 70% child malnutrition rates, migrant worker marginalization, rampant extreme poverty, and production of fantastic coffee.
The company is also a customer-owned co-op, so when you buy a coffee subscription, you also become a perpetual part-owner and have a say in the company. This, combined with that ECC deals directly with farmers, means there is *literally* no middle man between you and your farmer.
Disclaimer: I’m one of the co-founders. We’re based in Toronto, Canada — shipping to Canada and the US. (Anyone can become a co-op member and micro-investor though.
Hi, My name is Alex, I am a Colombian coffee grower and I am more than happy to sell you all the coffee from my farm and my family would be interested too.
we produce specialty coffee and we would like to start exporting it. if you can send me your information I will be honor to send you a sample of green beans ready to roast.