As commodity coffee prices sagged at historic lows throughout much of 2019, many of the world’s largest coffee buyers held their tongues as tightly as they pulled their purse strings. 2019 saw a number of heavily funded, collaborative pre-competitive and proprietary initiatives geared towards improving the livelihoods of coffee producers. Numerous large coffee-buying corporations also turned to the bond market to fund sustainability initiatives, and famed economist Jeffrey Sachs took his swing at the coffee industry, reinforcing the idea that a business-as-usual approach in commodity coffee trading will continue to put coffee farmers and even entire coffee economies at origin in peril. Starbucks issued its first sustainability bond, at $500 million, in 2016. At the time, it was considered an innovative means of corporate financing for sustainability projects.

Source: Ethiopian News December 23, 2019 14:15 UTC