“We know these days how vital sustainable cultivation methods are"

Mr. Munyui, since 2009 Tchibo, ECOM Coffee and Rainforest Alliance have been co-operating on a project with the objective of achieving certification to Rainforest Alliance standard for the co-operative.  In addition to this, in May 2010 your co-operative entered into the development partnership with ECOM Coffee, the Deutsche Gesellschaft für Internationale Zusammenarbeit (GIZ) on behalf of the German Federal Ministry of Economic Cooperation and Development, the World Bank, the 4C Association, Tchibo and the Rainforest Alliance. What’s changed since then?

The activities associated with the project afford us the opportunity to provide the farmers in our co-operative with better training. They take part in regular training sessions in which they learn all they need to know about coffee cultivation in today’s world: from the correct use of fertilisers to environmentally sustainable farming methods. We want to prepare our cultivation region for the challenges of the future by increasing its sustainability – the partnership is helping us to make progress on this journey. We find that the individual activities of the two projects often overlap, because at the core of both is the idea of sustainable farming and business activities.

What successes have you achieved to date?

We have worked hard to achieve certification to Rainforest Alliance standard. Last year we were visited by independent auditors, who gave us a catalogue of corrective measures. We have spent the last few months responding to the Rainforest Alliance’s requirements point by point. Recently we received our certification – a fabulous success. 

And what are the challenges you are facing?

The greatest challenges emerge from climate change. Our farmers are increasingly being confronted with its effects. As an example, we can no longer predict precipitation as well as we could just a few years ago. Often it rains so hard that the rainfall damages the coffee plants. At other times, we suffer from long periods of drought, especially in the lower-lying regions of our co-operative. We are also seeing increasing temperature fluctuations, which make our plants more susceptible to disease, and growth and harvest cycles harder to predict.

Are there any ways of halting this development?

There are at least ways of countering the negative impact of changes in the weather on coffee cultivation. In order to do this, of course, we first need to understand how our behaviour – such as deforestation or growing coffee in the immediate vicinity of watercourses – impacts local weather conditions. The training sessions we have had have contributed to raising awareness of these issues and have put us in a position to respond to them.

In what way?

Today, for instance, we know how important it is to plant local varieties of tree on our fields and our land. They protect our delicate Arabica plants from the strongest intensity of solar radiation and reduce the impact of heavy downpours. At the same time, the trees’ roots help preserve the quality of the soil, maintain the water balance and slow down processes of erosion. Dams protect the fertile soil from being washed away by driving rain. We have even worked with the experts to set up a small tree nursery where we raise seedlings for new coffee plants and indigenous shade trees.

Can seedlings combat climate change?

Of course, this is only one of a series of measures with which we are responding to the challenges posed to us by global warming. Another, for example, is that we are trialling coffee plants that can cope better with temperature fluctuations. Overall, I think that despite everything, we can look to the future with confidence and continue to increase our production volumes even in these difficult conditions – and also sustain the level of quality our customers have become used to. I’m not the only one with such an optimistic outlook – many of the young farmers who had given up growing coffee because it was no longer lucrative enough for them are now returning to coffee farming.

Mr. Munyui, thank you very much for taking the time to speak with us.