Trade Free Coffee Now Option Across Campus

By Ioana Patringenaru I Nov. 28, 2005

On a sunny day at Café Ventanas, most customers were sipping sodas. But the few that were sipping coffee could enjoy it with a clear conscience.

That's because UCSD's Dining and Housing Services now offers fair trade coffee as an option at all their locations. The fair trade label comes with a guarantee that:

. Farmers have earned a living wage
. Workers have used environmentally friendly techniques
. No child or forced labor was involved.

Student Eveline Houg refills her cup of fair trade coffee at Café Ventanas.

While OceanView Terrace and Café Ventanas already offered fair trade coffee in past years, officials decided to add that option at all other facilities this year after receiving requests from several student groups, said Brian Klippel, associate director of Housing and Dining Services.

The UCSD chapter of One Earth One Justice was one of those groups. The nonprofit organization wants to educate students about social and environmental causes.

"I've always thought that people should do what's within their means to promote justice and sustainability," said Viraf Soroushian, UCSD coordinator for the organization.

Americans, who consume so many goods, have a big responsibility promoting these causes, he said. To hear Soroushian tell it, fair trade coffee is only the beginning. He'd like UCSD to become a fair trade campus, offering products such as fair trade chocolate, bananas and tea.

"I think most students agree with the concept of fair trade and the idea that we should be more helpful for our neighbors," said Soroushian, a fourth-year student and a sociology and economics major.

More than half of the coffee that Housing and Dining Services sells is fair trade, Klippel said. Some facilities offer only fair trade coffee, others sell it as an option. It comes from exotic locales, such as Columbia, Ethiopia and Indonesia. It's also organically grown, said Klippel.

Some of the companies that sell fair trade coffee also have a charitable mission. For example, Pura Vida Coffee, whose products are available at Café Ventanas, runs a program that provides food, computer classes and other activities for 500 children each year in Costa Rica, according to the company's Web site.

A flier gives students more information about fair trade coffee and Pura Vida Coffee, the company that provides coffee for Café Ventanas.

Third-year students Eveline Houg and Sian Bradley said selling fair trade coffee was a good idea. "I think it's a good thing just to make students more aware of it," said Houg, who is from the Netherlands and was drinking a 16 oz cup of coffee, which she later refilled, at Café Ventanas around lunchtime. Both Houg and Bradley knew what fair trade was. By contrast, Cindy Hung, a freshman, didn't. She said it wasn't all that important to her, adding she usually doesn't drink coffee on campus, preferring to grab an espresso at Starbucks.

Overall coffee consumption on campus has roughly stayed the same since Dining and Housing Services has introduced fair trade coffee, Klippel said.

For more information: http://hds.ucsd.edu/diningservices/ftc.html