Peru : La Florida
In Peru SOS Faim strives to improve the living conditions of small coffee and cocoa producers providing assistance to eight cooperatives in three regions of the country: La Florida, Satipo, Pangoa, Alto Palomar, Naranjillo, San Juan del Oro, Valle Incahuasi and Perené.
SOS Faim also works with a second-level association “Café Perú” uniting eight cooperatives and with two umbrella organizations: “La Junta Nacional del Café” (coffee producers) and “APPCACAO” (cocoa producers).
Below you will find details concerning the project run in cooperation with one of the above-mentioned organizations, La Florida.
La FLORIDA is a coffee growers cooperative which seeks to identify market niches and to guarantee its members a decent income for their work.
The context: Today only 1/13th of the price you pay for your coffee goes to the grower. Such a price structure does not allow millions of coffee growers to cover at least their production costs. Moreover, they are not able to diversify into new crops.
A project to assist the local population: La Florida aims at avoiding the maximum of middlemen in coffee trade and the prices they impose in order to sell its members’ crops at fair price. Since 1995, which marked the end of terrorism in the country, La Florida has diversified its project adapting its products for niche markets (like organic coffee or branded coffee) and developing its activities (beans selection, packing, etc.). La Florida also created Crediflorida, a microfinance institution which provides coffee growers with production credits.
A cooperative which gives results: 3600 families of coffee-growers who are members of La Florida have been able to increase their productivity and the quality of coffee beans. In consequence, they have been able to negotiate better prices for their crops. The additional profits are reinvested by the community in the purchase of equipment or handed out to the farmers who can either diversify their crops or improve the living conditions of the whole community through road-building, for example.
Peru has become the first world exporter of organic coffee, which is almost entirely produced by small coffee growers. Thanks to the excellent quality of the coffee as well as the social role the cooperative plays, La Florida meets the standards of the fair trade market which guarantees the producers a better price.
