BBC News | BUSINESS | Coffee farmers 'face destitution' (#)

„Oxfam says farmers are losing out Meanwhile, the charity says, big multinational food companies, cafe and restaurant chains in rich nations have gained enormously from the drop in prices. The value of raw coffee beans has fallen sharply in the last three years due to overproduction, but prices paid for the processed product in consuming nations have remained much the same. Minimum wage Oxfam says the price of raw coffee exported from producer countries accounts for less than 7% of the eventual cost of coffee to Western consumers - the rest, over 90%, goes to coffee processors and retailers in rich countries. Oxfam cites increased profits at Nestle, the giant Swiss instant coffee processor, and the fashionable American coffee shop chain Starbucks as evidence of its case.“

http://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/business/newsid_1333000/ 1333204.stm - Cached

Amazon.com: Books: Glass, Paper, Beans : Revelations on the Nature and Value of Ordinary Things (#)

„But in our society, even as technology makes certain kinds of information more accessible than ever, other connections are irrevocably lost.In Glass, Paper, Beans, Leah Cohen traces three simple commodities on their geographic and semantic journey from her rickety table at the Someday Café to their various points of origin. As Cohen draws the reader Oz-like across time and continents, she brings to life three unforgettable characters whose labor provides the glass for her mug, the pulp for her newspaper and the beans for her cup of coffee. In prose as sophisticated as it is simple, she braids the myths, lore, and history of these three simple staples and conjures an unseen world where economics, fetishization, and manufacture meet.An elegant and inspired inquiry into the true nature of things, Glass, Paper, Beans is a classic work on the economy of everyday life.“

http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/asin/038549257x/ref=nosim/ megnutcom - Cached

CoffeeGeek - Bean There, Roasted That, Part Two (#)

„There are several different methods used in coffee roasting, from traditional drum roasters to modern fluid bed units as well as different theories on roasting styles, from very fast ‘high yield’ roasting to very slow ‘Brasilian’ roasting and even a ‘twice-roasted’ technique is used by some. Personally I like ‘old fashioned’ natural coffees with their full taste and low acidity and use a drum roaster that draws hot air through the tumbling beans as they roast. This enables an even roast from the hot air with the ‘traditional’ flavours of drum roasting. Fluid bed roasting uses heated air forced through ‘floating’ coffee beans which gives the coffee a clean finish and a ‘bright’ taste.“

http://www.coffeegeek.com/opinions/terrym/ 01-13-2002 - Cached

Tips on Coffee - Did you know...? (#)

„In the ancient Arab world, coffee became such a staple in family life that one of the causes allowed by law for marital separation was a husband's refusal to produce coffee for his wife. Raw coffee beans, soaked in water and spices, are chewed like candy in many parts of Africa. In the last three centuries, 90% of all people living in the Western world have switched from tea to coffee. Coffee represents 75% of all the caffeine consumed in the United States.“

http://www.tips-on-coffee.com/ print_version.php?s=106 - Cached

It's All About Coffee (#)

„The waveRoast unit is controlled by sophisticated software pre-programmed with a selection of 12 proprietary roasting "profiles." The raw green coffee beans are packaged in a patent-pending sealed single-use cartridge that is placed inside the waverRoaster(TM). Each cartridge includes a recommended roast profile to achieve an optimum roast as suggested by our team of professional cuppers and roasters. The waveRoaster gives the ultimate coffee experience because the system, in all aspects, is user friendly.“

http://www.aboutcoffee.net/ 2004_04_18_bcearc.html - Cached

Global Exchange : cctimes082699.html (#)

„The group argues that many small farmers are impoverished by selling their coffee below market price, and large bean growers are more likely to clear cut rain forests to grow coffee beans. The group then sells raw coffee beans to middlemen called roasters in the United States who toast the beans brown. The roasters sell the beans to retail shops.“

http://www.globalexchange.org/economy/coffee/ cctimes082699.html - Cached

Amazon.com: Books: The Coffee Trader : A Novel (Ballantine Reader's Circle) (#)

„You can imagine what kind of effect raw coffee beans would have on the virgin system. As Daniel begins to have one menacing conversation after another, it is hard to tell whether there�s real danger involved or whether he�s just flying close to paranoia on caffeine. �The Coffee Trader� works well in its descriptions of a time, place, and culture, but less well as a coherent mystery.“

http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/asin/0375760903/ - Cached

CoffeeKids.org (INeedCoffee.com) (#)

„Many rural farmers have to sell their coffee cherries to opportunistic middlemen, called "coyotes," for very little profit. By having a solar dryer, the farmers remain in control of the more lucrative raw coffee beans. The environment also profits from the use of solar dryers. The solar dryers replace drum dryers that are run on petroleum or wood chopped from the local forests.“

http://www.ineedcoffee.com/00/08/coffeekids/ - Cached

Mammoth Lakes, CA - Looney Bean Coffeeshop (INeedCoffee.com) (#)

„Every three months Brent drives to San Francisco, to the Port of Oakland, to pick up more coffee. He loads nearly 30 150-pound bags of green, raw beans--4,000 pounds of coffee--into the back of his pickup and drives it back to Mammoth to be roasted. The beans remain fresh until they're roasted. Once that happens, they have a ten-day life.“

http://www.ineedcoffee.com/01/08/looney/ print.asp - Cached

illy caffè North America (#)

„Its strategy is simple: to distinguish itself from the competition through unsurpassed excellence. This policy of pursuing quality is followed down to the last detail: from the moment the raw coffee beans arrive at the processing plant to the time they are shipped out in sealed cans, the product is controlled 114 times.“

http://www.illyusa.com/pr/ the_business_of_coffee.htm - Cached

The Home Roasting Tradition (#)

„A neighborhood coffeeroasting shop was an urban luxury. Settlers appreciated the fact that coffeein the form of raw green beans could be stored indefinitely, or at leastuntil their next trip to the general store.“

http://www.sweetmarias.com/tradition.html - Cached