Human Rights Activists to Protest Starbucks, Demanding that the Company Guarantee a Living Wage for Families Harvesting Its Coffee Beans

San Francisco Demonstration the First in a Series of Upcoming Protests Nationwide Calling on Starbucks to Start Buying Fair Trade Certified Coffee

San Francisco--Shocked by a recent media report linking coffee giant Starbucks to child labor on the farms from which the company buys its coffee beans, human rights activists will protest in front of a local Starbucks cafe to demand that the company immediately begin selling coffee that is "Fair Trade Certified."

Protesters will gather at 12:00 noon at the Starbucks cafe on 4th Street between Howard and Mission streets.

The activists have been spurred by a report broadcast Thursday night on San Francisco's local ABC affiliate, KGO Channel 7, documenting Starbucks' connection with child labor in the coffee-growing highlands of Guatemala.

"Starbucks is the largest gourmet coffee retailer in the country, opening up an average of a new store every day, and earning more than $164 million in profits in 1999," says Deborah James, director of the Fair Trade Program at Global Exchange, a San Francisco-based human rights group that is a leader in the corporate accountability and Fair Trade movements. "As an industry leader, Starbucks has to guarantee that the coffee beans it is selling were not picked by children in exploitative conditions. Starbucks has the resources to make child labor a priority, but, despite their protestations, they have not yet done enough. The problem is this: Child labor exists because farming families are not paid a living wage. Fair Trade guarantees that living wage."

The San Francisco demonstration was the first strike in a nationwide grassroots campaign targeted at Starbucks' labor practices. Similar demonstrations are planned across the country for next week as protesters call on Starbucks to purchase Fair Trade certified coffee. Protests will take place in New Orleans, Chicago, Berkeley, and New Haven, Connecticut.

Fair Trade supporters also plan to put pressure on the company at its upcoming annual shareholders meeting in Seattle, which will occur on Monday, February 14. A group of socially conscious Starbucks shareholders concerned about labor conditions on the plantations from which Starbucks buys its coffee beans will attend the meeting to petition fellow stock holders and company officials to start buying Fair Trade certified beans.

Dozens of gourmet coffee companies across the country have signed onto the Fair Trade certified system since its US debut in the spring of 1999. Global Exchange has been in negotiations with the Starbucks since September, 1999 in an effort to get the company to begin carrying a line of Fair Trade certified beans. But the company has refused to join the growing list of coffee companies participating in Fair Trade certification.

Many small coffee farmers receive prices for their coffee that are less than the costs of production, forcing them into a cycle of poverty and debt. Intensive coffee farming also leads to environmental problems such as deforestation and bird habitat destruction. Also, the use of pesticides and chemical fertilizers on large-scale coffee plantations contributes to air and water pollution.

Fair Trade works to correct these imbalances by guaranteeing a minimum price for small farmers' harvest and encouraging organic and sustainable cultivation methods that are safer for communities. Fair Trade farmers are provided badly needed credit and assured a minimum of $1.26 per pound. In comparison, the world price usually hovers around $1 per pound, but most farmers earn less than half that since they are forced to sell to exploitative middle men.. With the profits generated from receiving a living wage, coffee growers are able to invest in their families' health care and education

Already, Fair Trade coffee is a well known and popular product in Canada, Japan and Europe, where it is widely sold across the continent and served in many corporate offices as well as the European Parliament. European consumers are also able to purchase many other Fair Trade Certified foodstuffs, including bananas, sugar, tea, honey, and cocoa. But Fair Trade Certification was introduced to the United States only this summer, when the Oakland-based organization TransFair launched its certification program.

The US consumes an estimated one-fifth of all the world's coffee, making it the largest consumer in the world. Fair Trade Certified coffee currently benefits 500,000 farming families in 20 countries; an increase in US demand would dramatically increase that number.