The bright potential future…
In politics and world economics the driving forces behind new trends and global changes are often the so-called Think-Tanks. They try to identify potential threats and opportunities, match them with possible reactions and come up with a prophecy of how the future may look like. Is the thought developed revolutionary then it provokes strong public reactions of general disagreement; is it along the line of what most people expect anyhow, then it does not cause any attention in public. May Walter Zwald be compared to such a Think-Tank? Having served the coffee business as a trader, a buyer for a roaster group and in political functions, he came up with a proposal to create a worldwide coffee fund to direct coffee to become the product that stands above all discredit and scandals. This was in the year 2000. Most people nodded at that time and only a few found his idea brilliant – although somewhat exaggerated. What did take him to announce this idea publicly? His answer is straightforward: “I noticed a trend in the reduction of quality in coffees and I simply did not want to see coffee degrading to a simple commodity where only price matters.” After all, coffee stands for his entire professional career and he has a profound identification with it. To accentuate this distinction between coffee and other commodities, Walter proposes the creation of a global fund on the bases of one dollar per bag for coordinated sustainability in coffee production and a coffee sector wide marketing approach to the public . Neutrality and transparency are key in this concept for attaining the required credibility among the wide public in every corner of the globe since, after all, THEY are the coffee consumers. His idea was then taken up by several people in the coffee business and with the start of the coffee crises, public pressure groups and fair-trade organizations took their chance in coffee
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. Wasn’t it exactly that what Walter tried to prevent? The on-going discussion on sustainability was certainly not what he aimed at, but most likely feared. Therefore he had reflected about the best solution over more than a year to come up with a ‘simple and stupid’ solution (as he likes to call his idea about the fund) that could be understood by everybody and, hopefully, implemented promptly. The coffee fund bases on the snowball effect. The contribution proposed is in a sound relation to the volumes of green coffee traded worldwide (1,5 % of CIF value) and totally insignificant when put in relation to one cup of coffee: US cents 0.02 per cup. Walter hopes that the effect of the actions initiated by the coffee fund will be multiplied exponentially both among coffee producers and the consumers. The coffee crises brought a noticeable divergence in the opinion on how to react to such a crises and had also the effect of an even fiercer competition on the consumer market where lowest price has become the driving force in the main stream market. In hindsight it is clear that there is no winner of these developments – with the exception of niche market players among which specialty and gourmet coffees are to be named in the first place. Also the consumers didn’t gain anything: they traded the gain of some dollars against the reduction in quality. Where does the coffee market head to? What predictions can us give Walter Zwald this time and what solution does he have? He is sceptical about the near future but remains confident that good coffees will eventually dominate the market again – because coffee is primarily product that is enjoyed by the gourmet of the consumer a not driven by their economic thoughts. Therefore, he goes on, market stimulation remains the key factor to driving coffee back to the universal product that stands for the culture of human mankind. He rises his finger, to say ‘but’, the consumers must be given the opportunity to learn about coffees from an independent institution and not from branded advertising because consumers don’t trust the industries. He further insists: „Consumers have first to detect their wish to consume coffee, and probably what type of coffee, cappuccino, ice-cold coffees, espressos, etc and then, in a second instance, decide which brand they prefer. That is why I continue to propose the coffee fund because it still has validity today: Produce highest quality coffee beans in the origins and work with consumers to show them how to enjoy coffee.” Five years after the first proposal of a coffee fund, the coffee business recognizes that they could have done better. Although the opinions remain divided whether a coffee fund could have made everything different, the coffee business may do good in asking the question again: Is Walter’s idea still valid? Could it really lead to the bright potential future of coffee?
Visit www.coffeefund.org.
