In celebration of its third year, Coffee Quality Institute’s (CQI) Partnership for Gender Equity (PGE) has launched an Equal Origins initiative.
“By April 2018, we’re looking for 100 committed leaders, businesses, and individuals to sponsor this initiative at an equal level of $1000 each, giving everyone an equal voice and stake in our shared commitment to equity, equality, and a healthy supply chain now and for generations to come,” PGE said in a statement.
The first 10 companies to commit to the Equal Origins project include Santa Cruz Coffee Roasters, Batdorf and Bronson, Salt Spring Coffee, Reunion Island Coffee, Blue Bottle, Dean’s Beans, Peace Coffee, Tate Coffee, Metad Pic and Single Origin.
Supporters will have access to specialised quarterly issue briefs and the chance to participate in the design of new tools that will advance knowledge, awareness, and action on the issue.
“Equity, such a simple thing, is a generations-long struggle for hundreds of thousands in coffee,” says Charlie Habegger, a coffee buyer for Blue Bottle Coffee. “While I resent constantly that initiatives such as Equal Origins are necessary in our world, they absolutely are. I participated in a PGE workshop for household-level change in Myanmar, and I think any rational person buying coffee would have seen the stability and profit potential this work can bring to communities when done well. Equity in supply chains should be the future we seek.”
Since contributing to the cause, Thomas Haigh, Head of coffee from Tate Coffee in the United Kingdom says PGE’s research has been fundamental to his understanding of equality and sustainability in the coffee value chain. “Contributing to Equal Origins has presented us the opportunity to be part of the wider conversation about gender equity and youth engagement in the coffee chain,” he says.
PGE was created in 2014 as a collaborative research and development initiative to better understand the link between gender equity and supply chain resilience and determine the best way to respond. PGE brings together a diverse array of industry and development partners to actively support gender equity in order to improve the quality of producers’ lives and the sustainable supply of quality coffee. For more information, visit www.coffeeinstitute.orgor to learn more about Equal Origins and how to get involved, visit www.genderincoffee.org/equalorigins
Image: Nicaraguan producers learn new home and farm planning tools in a PGE household level workshop, March 2017.
