Case studies 6/9


protection and soil and water conservation techniques. The project has also seen the local community trained in how to make more efficient use of firewood (covering and rearranging wood so it stays dry and aired), plus the supply and installation of eco-stoves for domestic heating and cooking. Today, 45 women’s groups have been trained on how to use the stove (cooking for around 2,000 people), 21 demo units have been made available with 54 people trained on how to build them. The company has also been keen to establish a biodiversity programmes to encourage its supply chain farmers to not become so reliant on their tea crops (often accounting for 90-100% of their income) and to grow crops to eat as well as crops to sell. The project has paid for the distribution of seeds for nutrient rich subsistence crops, such as kale, spinach, carrots and onions.


This is beyond Fairtrade. This is beyond sustainability too. In the face of threats to its supply of raw material, the traditional sustainable business – that we have come to describe in these pages – might have upped sticks and sought out a new supplier, one that was less vulnerable to


the effects of climate change, in a bid to sustain its quality and quantity of raw product. But this is not the Cafédirect way, says Weinmann.


“You have to have a long-term view of things and get sustainability woven in,” he says.


“If you just take the efficiency and financial aspect into account of how and where you procure your raw materials, that might work well. But in the agricultural sector, especially sourcing from small, very vulnerable communities, that is not a sustainable model and you have to put other mechanisms into place. “It is about reinvestment to create a win-win situation that supports these communities to deliver quality coffee and get better yields. They will then be stronger organisations and businesses in their own right. And if they are more sustainable and stronger as grower communities, it reflects back to us as a busi- ness to be able to deliver that through the product.”

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