Honduras
Coarene
- small but strong coffee cooperative from a hilly region of Honduras
- supplies unroasted, fair-trade coffee directly to Oxfam
- has fought for years against a disease affecting coffee plants
Honduras
Quality, fair-trade coffee from a tiny Honduran cooperative
In the hilly interior of Honduras, the COARENE cooperative (Cooperativa Agropecuaria Regional Nuevo Edén Limitada) unites a hundred or so small-scale coffee growers.
Since 1991 they’ve been working closely with each other to tackle the many challenges they face. Despite its extremely limited means, COARENE succeeds in delivering quality coffee.
The cooperative sourced financing from various funds to construct their own washing station (info in Dutch) in 2019. This has given them more control over the processing of their coffee. And this in turn leads to coffee of a higher quality.
The fight against coffee fungus
In 2015 the members’ production was hit especially badly by coffee rust or ‘La Roya’ as it’s known there. This fungal disease caused irrevocable damage to many coffee plants. It will take years to get production back up to where it was.
The Honduran cooperative helped its producers by means of various projects:
- The cooperative is providing its members with new coffee plants.
- It’s also helping them switch to organic production.
- Meanwhile, Oxfam Fair Trade only buys organic coffee from COARENE.
Through our members we support the whole community, in harmony with nature.
Amilcar Rodriguez Recinos
COARENE & Oxfam
- COARENE and Oxfam are built on the same principles: solidarity between farmers, a commitment to progress for the whole community and ownership for all stakeholders.
- Oxfam has been buying green (unroasted) coffee directly from COARENE since 2010. We take that coffee and process it into many of the blends you can find in our stores.
- In collaboration with HIVA, we have developed an HRDD programme, in which we focus on the working conditions of farmers and workers. This way we can analyse how certain issues can be improved. Even though being fair trade provides guarantees, Oxfam Fair Trade wants to go one step further.