Agriculture Reference
In-Depth Information
“Do you know, when you wrote the leter, did the buyer get angry? Did
the buyer understand?”
George replied that his opinion was that they understood: “I think they
understood, because we sent the leter along with [news]paper cutings.
So they must have understood.” The newspaper stories that he mailed
with the leter included information about the rise in cofee prices in
South India.
To gauge the receptiveness of the buyer, I questioned him further.
“Then how many weeks, months, did it take for the buyer to respond?”
He answered, “We wrote in January, and in February
—”
I interrupted him. “Oh, in one month?”
He nodded and confirmed it. “In one month, they decided.”
Organic Wayanad, with IOFPCL's help, not only bargained to get an ad-
vance from its coffee buyer in 2010 but successfully and quickly persuaded
the buyer to increase its payment to farmers to 55 rupees per kilogram
for coffee (table 2). This type of bargaining is uncommon, particularly
in conventional coffee markets. Organic Wayanad's organic certification
and IOFPCL's assistance with marketing created this opportunity for di-
rect negotiation, with real benefits for farmers. During a monthly meet-
ing of Organic Wayanad, farmers agreed to utilize the profits from this
and previous orders toward school scholarships for the children of group
members.
To understand the role certification is playing in Kerala's organic
farming scene, and to find out how farmers are feeling about certification
processes, I asked Chackochan, as a pioneer certified organic farmer in
Kerala, for his thoughts about IOFPCL's and Organic Wayanad's relation-
ship to this particular cofee buyer. George, for instance, had admited
that some of the ICS's farmers were disappointed that the buyer would not
give them more money per kilogram of coffee, given the current market
rate of 52 rupees per kilogram for conventional coffee. Chackochan, on
the other hand, remained convinced that IOFPCL and Organic Wayanad
had established a long-term and dependable relationship with this buyer.
This relationship would likely provide income security and stability for
farmers in years to come, especially through the inevitable boom-and-
bust cycles of agriculture. He admited that relationship building with
