Agreement to Help Small Coffee Producers

The National Council for Competition (CNC) and Oxfam, the Spanish organization, signed an agreement in which they have committed to identify, co-finance and implement educational and strengthening activities for the clusters of small coffee producers. This will include promoting the development of brand names to be produced by coffee collectives in order to give them a competitive edge to the small coffee producers throughout the country.

Andrés Van der Horst Álvarez, Executive Director of the CNC and Luz María Abreu, Intermon Oxfam director for the Dominican Republic, said their respective organizations will work in a coordinated fashion on an assistance program for local coffee producers, according to a press release from the CNC.

Van der Horst said the goal of the strategy of Country Brand, “is to design umbrella brands, much like existing collectives that indicate the business origin of their products and which collectives are involved. This will allow them, in the case of small coffee producers, to enter into new markets and obtain prestige based on the quality of their product.” Luz María Abreu added that one of the objectives of Oxfam is to eradicate injustice and poverty through programs and projects geared to improve the quality of life among the poorest people. “We understand that improving the competitive edge of the small producers through a collective brand of their products, we are helping them to improve the quality of their lives.”

More Goals

Both organizations also intend to unify their efforts in a program that will support the collective costs of producing coffee including developing and putting into practice a marketing plan for coffee producers as well as a plan to support and strengthen social and environmental responsibility of coffee bean producers by carrying out studies and research to promote the development of this sector.

They will jointly promote initiatives, projects and action plans with the goal of adopting measures to increase the competitive capacity of small coffee producers. This will include making available the best development practices on the subject by offering training and technical assistance throughout the entire process of coffee growing, producing and marketing.

The CNC and Oxfam decided to work together as both organizations are interested in enhancing the capacity of the productive sector, especially small coffee producers, improving their quality of life and increasing the competitive value of their products through the implementation of systematic and specialized programs.

As part of the joint actions, the CNC will hire a consultant to develop a collective brand of coffee as part of its plan to improve competition through development and promotion of collective and country brands.

Intermon Oxfam, as an agent of Oxfam International, has been working for more than 10 years in the areas of infrastructure, training, organization, investment and regional integration of the country’s coffee producers. The organization, to that effort, has invested a sum of approximately 3,620,000.00 Euros. The Federation of Coffee Producers of the Southern Region (FEDECARES) and the Union of Coffee Producers of the North (Unacafen) are its national counterparts. As a result of the work being done by both organizations, the country is moving toward the building of a national coffee program, the goal of which is a collective brand of coffee produced on a small scale.

These activities are of special significance in the Dominican Republic, due to the challenges facing it from the commercial opening and integration of the international markets with which it must compete in terms of production, quality and services, noted the CNC press release.