Conservation & Coffee - a great blog

I discovered a great new green blog this week.

"Coffee & Conservation" at www.coffeehabitat.com is the blog of an ornithologist, Julie, who has thoroughly investigated the agricultural methods of coffee companies. Her investigation has answered a lot of questions about which companies are using sustainable methods, and which ones aren't. If you want to buy bird-friendly coffee, or labor-friendly coffee, or 100% arabica, check out Julie's blog. She kindly wrote to me to tell me that Millstone Coffee is not as green as they profess to be. This was in reference to a post I wrote here on Veggie Revolution on Bird-friendly Chocolate and Coffee on December 6, 2007.

For the real deal about Millstone Coffee, see Julie's post:
http://www.coffeehabitat.com/2007/03/millstones_orga.html

Julie also says that Rainforest Alliance's environmental criteria for certifying coffee are not as stringent as Smithsonian's. She goes into this in several posts; here's one:
http://www.coffeehabitat.com/2007/07/quick-look-at-d.html

Even if the Millstone line were sustainable, P&G, and the other large conglomerates, played -- and continue to play -- a large role in the coffee crisis, which Julie outlines here:
http://www.coffeehabitat.com/2006/02/the_coffee_cris.html

Here's P&G's corporate responsibility profile:
http://www.coopamerica.org/programs/rs/profile.cfm?id=279

So. If you enjoy drinking coffee, like I do, let's pay more attention to how it's being grown. Coffee is one crop that can be grown in rain forests without cutting down trees. It's important that consumers who care make the effort to support sustainable tropical agriculture. If we don't support it, who will?

Key words:: certified coffee, organic coffee, fair trade coffee, fair trade, coffee, rainforest, entrepreneur, sustainable, conglomerate