Get Certified: It’s Good for Your Health!

In honor of World Health Day on April 7th, here’s a look at how certification can support the health and wellbeing of farmworkers and their families around the world.

Finca Buenos Aires supplied the farm’s 20 households with water filters, an improvement that led to a dramatic decline in gastro-intestinal illnesses.

In Nicaragua, in the coffee-growing region of Matagalpa, Finca La Cumplida is working with local residents to cultivate a harmonious relationship with nature and making great strides in reforesting a region ravaged by agriculture and livestock.

Finca La Cumplida first achieved Rainforest Alliance certification in 2005. The farm has 760 permanent residents, but during coffee picking season it employs up to 2,000 workers.

As part of the certification process, La Cumplida has a health clinic with a 24-hour nurse to attend to emergencies, first aid and minor surgical needs. Medical consultations are provided twice a month: once by a doctor from the Ministry of Health and once by a doctor from the Nicaraguan nongovernmental agency Profamilia. Patients are charged a nominal fee (usually less than the equivalent to US$ 1) for medical services, and the farm picks up the bill for medicine or more serious medical treatment that would be otherwise unaffordable to the patients. The farm’s owner, Clemente Ponçon, estimates that the farm spends several hundred dollars a month on medicine and other medical care for its workers. The clinic also focuses on preventive care, with an emphasis on health education and reproductive care.

In southern India, eight tea estates have earned Rainforest Alliance certification; all of them sell their leaves to Unilever for the Lipton Yellow Label and PG tips brands. Workers on the Glendale Tea Estate benefit from social and healthcare programs, including access to doctors and nurses at an on-site hospital, schools and daycare centers.

At the Kairbetta Estate, the management provides free medical aid for all family members of workers and tea pluckers, as well as community members who would not otherwise have access to healthcare. The estate employs an on-site nurse who can attend to injuries and illnesses immediately.

In Guatemala, five generations of the Guzmán family have run the Finca Buenos Aires in the Retalhuleu region, a coffee farm that sits at an altitude of 2,000 feet (600 meters) atop a vast network of ancient Mayan and Olmec ruins. The farm has been producing aromatic beans beneath the shade of the forest canopy since 1882.

Felipe Guzmán’s commitment to sustainable farming runs as deep as his family roots in the local community.  Guzmán guided the farm to Rainforest Alliance certification in 2003. A few years later, Finca Buenos Aires supplied the farm’s 20 households with water filters, an improvement that led to a dramatic decline in gastro-intestinal illnesses. The farmworkers are also enrolled with Guatemala’s national healthcare program; Guzmán provides with free medication twice a year, and employees can also buy many basic medicines at reduced rates.

In Peru, Sustainable Tourism Revives a Forgotten Andean Community

Not long ago, Mullak’as Misminay was a forgotten Andean community situated in the middle of the Sacred Valley of the Inca. The 500 families who lived there struggled to earn a decent income through subsistence agriculture and textile production, missing a huge opportunity to earn a secure livelihood through sustainable tourism. With help from Condor Travel, a Rainforest Alliance Verified™ tour operator, Mullak’as Misminay residents have made incredible strides. Today, they are a powerful example of the potential of community-based rural tourism to change lives. Since 2008, Condor Travel has helped the community to generate new revenue from tourism while promoting the cultural identity of its people. We spoke with Daysy Ángeles, a project manager at Condor Travel, about the community’s transformation.

Tell us a little about the project. 

Thanks to sponsorship from the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB-MIF) and the Dutch Cooperation Agency (SNV), Condor Travel has helped the Mullak’as Misminay people to develop an “experiential tourism” offering that allows visitors to learn first-hand about the community’s way of life while helping local residents become skilled providers of lodging, food and guided tours.

We have provided training in basic hospitality and cuisine techniques to participating local residents, and we are developing a program to improve agricultural and textile techniques to strengthen their capabilities so that their products can gain access to new markets. We are also investing in improving the area’s infrastructure, including organizing and optimizing signage for tourist attractions, facilitating distribution and access to drinking water and food, and financing improvements to bathrooms, kitchens, room furnishings and dining areas in houses that will receive visitors. The project also includes training programs, enhanced equipment, and better marketing for porters, artisans and farmers.

Why did Condor Travel decide to support this community initiative?

We have had a close relationship with the Mullak’as Misminay community since the 1990s, when we started to hire local men to work as porters, cooks and assistants for adventure routes like the famous Inca Trail to Machu Picchu. Then we began a philanthropic support plan to help them in matters of health, education and family, which strengthened the trust between the company and the community. Finally, we got the chance to implement the inclusive business project in experiential tourism, creating new “win-win” opportunities for the business and the community.

Tell us more about the families benefiting from the project. 

The project aims to benefit 300 families by developing inclusive businesses in economic activities such as tourism, agriculture, crafts and portaging. We are working on the construction of a water storage system with the municipality, IDB-MIF and SNV, which will improve access to water for drinking and for irrigation, increasing the social and economic impact of the project.

Condor Travel’s Mullak’as Misminay project placed third in the 2013 Responsible Tourism Showcase at this year’s Educational Travel Conference.  What did that recognition mean to you?

This international recognition comes after five years of constant work on the project, so it is certainly an incentive to further improve and expand the benefits to other communities of Cuzco.

How did the community react to the award?

The community received the news very enthusiastically! The people see it as a reward for their efforts to learn and launch a new business that is opening new opportunities for their families. The recognition also included a monetary award that will be used to give some scholarships to young people in the community who are being trained in Cuzco.

How do you involve tourists in your sustainability efforts? 

Through the experiential tours, visitors learn about and experience the community’s way of life. For example, after a traditional welcome with music, they are encouraged to participate in tilling the land, using traditional farming techniques. They also learn about how local plants used as healing folk remedies and in making natural dyes, and how textiles are made by hand using ancient techniques.

This project was implemented by Condor Travel’s nonprofit association, Wings. Can you tell us more about Wings? 

Condor Travel founded Wings to promote and implement corporate social responsibility and sustainable tourism programs, and to channel aid and donations from our strategic partners who want to support low-income communities through responsible tourism.

Wings is also a platform to promote volunteerism in the communities of Cuzco, and to disseminate the challenges and benefits of inclusive businesses in national tourism networks and private sector unions.

How does Condor Travel benefit from its commitment to sustainability?

Condor Travel has created a high-quality, innovative tourism product that generates unique experiences for its customers. We’ve noticed an increase in sales for these kinds of products, which motivates us to design new programs involving communities.

In addition, with the efforts that we implement to care for the environment (such as using less paper and energy), we generate significant savings and help raise environmental awareness among our collaborators, which has repercussions on their family life.

What’s next for the Mullak’as Misminay project?

We hope to expand the project’s benefits to other sectors of the community–for example, by improving the water supply, we can strengthen agriculture. Wings is expanding its areas of work, including new communities in its corporate social responsibility program and promoting the destination to volunteers to support the development of new sustainable tourism programs in the area.

Our general goal is to continue working under the guidelines of sustainable tourism at national and international destinations, so our next step will be to involve the regional Condor Travel offices in South America in these projects.

Visit www.SustainableTrip.org to learn more about sustainable tourism operations like Condor Travel that are good for people, wildlife and the global environment.

Improving Access and Equity for Smallholder Carbon Projects

Jeff Hayward, director of the Rainforest Alliance’s climate program, weighs in on the challenges facing smallholders interested in participating in carbon projects. 

It is abundantly clear that there are systematic barriers to entry preventing smallholder participation in carbon projects. We’ve seen this firsthand, whether validating forest carbon projects or helping communities and smallholder farmers in the field in Mexico and Ghana to develop their own projects.

The Rainforest Alliance is tackling some of these barriers in an effort to make the Climate Community and Biodiversity (CCB) Standards more accessible for smallholder-led projects.  We’re doing this through a new project with the Climate, Community and Biodiversity Alliance (CCBA), the Nature Conservation Research Centre (NCRC) Ghana, and hand-in-hand with our staff in Ghana.

One of the smallholder projects studied was the Rainforest Alliance’s Forest, Communities, Climate Alliance Project in Ghana.

Challenges Faced by Smallholders

Through an in-depth analysis of smallholder projects and an assessment of how various voluntary standards (like the Forest Stewardship Council, the Sustainable Agriculture Network, the Voluntary Carbon Standard and the Gold Standard) enable smallholder participation, several factors have emerged as challenges:

• Unique characteristics of smallholder communities can result in difficulties in organization and preparation required to meet carbon standards.
• The complex nature of smallholder governance structures can make it hard for them to manage a carbon project on their own.
• The financial and technical requirements needed to obtain validation are often too challenging for smallholders to face on their own.
• Communities usually do not have the skills needed to determine difficult calculations, such as baselines or carbon leakage, and must hire or partner with outside experts.
• Grouping multiple small parcels of land to encompass one “project” adds complexity.
• Land tenure and use rights are often not clear or resolved.

Addressing Smallholder Challenges within Carbon Standards

The barriers to implementing a community-led carbon project are substantial and won’t be reconciled overnight. However, by revising the CCB standards we can help alleviate some of these issues by making the standards more suitable for communities.

To get a better sense of the real-life challenges projects face, the Rainforest Alliance, CCBA and NCRC facilitated a learning exchange workshop in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia for 16 smallholder carbon project managers. These project managers provided first-hand accounts of project challenges and helped us to identify strategies for increasing smallholder access and benefits to the CCB Standards, including:

• Developing tools, guidance and capacity building to benefit community- and smallholder-led projects. Guidance related to calculating leakage and developing monitoring and evaluation tools were found to be particularly important.
• Relieving the cost barriers of coming into compliance, auditing and earning benefits from being validated and verified to the CCB Standards. This could include developing special provisions for smallholder projects that allow new parcels of land to be added to grouped projects. This would reduce the overall cost of validation and would promote growth of the project over time.
• Collaborating with other standards to create guidelines for projects seeking dual certifications and thus alleviate duplication of information.

A Look Ahead

Building on this analysis, the Rainforest Alliance’s climate program is providing guidance to the revision of the CCB Standards. Next, we will apply lessons learned to support the development of a CCB validated project in the Juabeso-Bia region of Ghana, encompassing thousands of smallholder cocoa farmers. Lastly, we’ll look for pilot opportunities for current and new Rainforest Alliance projects designed to engage rural communities in REDD+ programs and carbon projects.

Ready to learn more? Visit the CCBA website to explore the CCBA Smallholders project and visit our website to access our climate standards review study.  

In Ecuador, An Entrepreneur Makes Sustainable Tourism Accessible for Disabled Tourists

Alfonso Eliécer Morales has spent his life turning adversity into opportunity. Despite an accident that left him unable to walk, he has excelled as an athlete: playing on Ecuador’s National Wheelchair Basketball Team in the 1989 Special Pan American Games; participating in the 1996 Paralympic Games in Atlanta; and creating and riding in the first wheelchair tour of Ecuador. Morales has also become a disability advocate, lecturing at nearly a dozen national and international events, and serving from 2005 to 2009 as a councilman for his community. Today, Morales owns and operates Hostal Familiar Las Grandillas, a Rainforest Alliance Verified lodge in Baños, Ecuador that caters to disabled tourists. 

Alfonso Morales at his hotel, Hostal Familiar Las Granadillas.

We spoke to Morales about his personal and professional journey.

How did your accident occur?

I was [on the job] driving a tractor when a nearby mountain collapsed and trapped me, fracturing a spinal vertebra. I was 20 years old.

When did you decide to become an athlete?

During my childhood, I loved climbing trees, hiking to discover nature and helping with daily tasks. I especially enjoyed being in the water and I excelled in swimming at my school. In 1990, three years after the accident and a painful rehabilitation process, I had finally gotten used to the wheelchair. So, I took part in and ended up winning the Quito Latest News track meet. This motivated me to participate in other national and international events. Sports helped me join in and overcome the constraints of my new lifestyle.

Why did you decide to become a tourism entrepreneur?

Three years after the accident, I was feeling more independent in my daily life. I returned to my hometown of Iluchi, in Baños de Agua Santa, which has always been a popular tourist destination. My grandmother gave me a very nice, strategically located and scenic piece of land in the community, and a few months later a highway was built nearby. At that point I said, “This is where I will make my home and my lodge.”

What inspired you to build a handicapped-accessible hotel?

Here it is very hard to find lodging accessible to travelers with disabilities like mine–and those that do exist are four or five star hotels that are too costly for most of us. This motivated me to offer an alternative.

How did your family and local community react to your plans?

Initially, they doubted that I could build this dream, mainly because of the financial investment that would be required. However, they knew it would be a success because of the setting, the landscape and the location. We are in the countryside, but with only 20 minutes of walking we can get to and from the city. In the end, everyone helped me somehow.

Was planning and promoting your hotel a challenge?

It hasn’t been easy. It was challenging to make contacts and publicize the community as a tourist destination – even though we are a tourist town, not all of its attractions have been well promoted. Gradually, people have gotten to know us and my own satisfied customers spread news about the project by word of mouth. It was also difficult to apply for one bank loan after another to complete the hostel. Fortunately, the project is seen as interesting and unique, and one with potential.

The view from Hostal Familiar Las Granadillas.

What makes Hostal Familiar Las Granadillas special?

Our location is advantageous–we are in a rural area but very close to the city and surrounded by three tourist trails. We also have an exceptional view of the southern part of the city, Santa Rosa de Runtun mountain, the La Virgen waterfalls, the Mintza mountains, Tungurahua volcano with its occasional eruptions of ash or water vapor, the Pastaza River, the Callejón Andino Oriental (East Andes Alley), the mountains of Sauces and the mountains of Pucara.

Our facilities are  also spacious: we have gardens, aquariums and a small collection of antiques. But what makes us stand out is the personal attention we give our visitors, whom we see as members of our family.

What other attractions bring tourists to the Iluchi community?

This community is very safe and the people are very friendly and unique in their traditions and solidarity. Illuchi is also a leader in organic farming and it is very close to the city. It has all the basic services thanks to the hard work of our community leaders and the access road is well maintained.

Why did you decide to adopt sustainable tourism practices?

I grew up in the countryside, so I identify with tranquility and the natural environment, and I am aware that I must be part of its conservation and cause minimal impact with my business. The training and ongoing support of the Rainforest Alliance encouraged me to become aware and to make more of a commitment.

Tell us about your hotel’s sustainability efforts.

The tables, furnishings and planters are made of wood that was left over from the building of our house. The wood used in our fireplace is a (non-traditional) eucalyptus species, or wood recycled from the greenhouses or the river. We use energy-saving light bulbs and fill the aquariums with rainwater. We light fireplaces with grease and oils recycled from the cafeteria. We recycle organic waste, plastic, and glass and use recycled pots as lamps, vases and flowerpots. We deliver recyclables to underprivileged people in the community so they can sell them and in return, they help us for half a day doing gardening.

We also hire local staff and buy food produced in the area. Our successful incentive plan called “Sweets or Fruits for Bottles” invites children of the community to bring in plastic bottles and empty glass jars, and in return we give them a fruit or candy. Students from the community are allowed to use our wireless internet connection free of charge. Finally, we provide free lodging to people who provide training to our community.

What messages do you hope to share with people touched by disability?

I try to convey my experiences very humbly so that people going through a similar situation know that nothing is impossible despite the difficulties; anything is possible if we know how to dream and work with faith and love for ourselves and others. Family is very important in this process, but mostly it has to do with willpower.

As part of this work, I developed a recreational tourism and independent life training plan for people with disabilities and their families. The program lasts from one week to three months and consists of activities related to creating an independent life and a little training in sustainability. The goal is to create citizens who are free, capable, aware and interactive.

What future plans do you have for your company?

We have many plans, particularly for expanding our space, providing better service every day and improving our processes for sustainability and the quality of life of my staff and customers.

Visit www.SustainableTrip.org to find other hotels and tourism destinations that are beautiful and beneficial. 

Hope in the Shade of Cocoa Trees

Ouedraogo Boureima was just four years old when, in 1985, his family left their village in Burkina Faso and walked across the border and into Côte d’Ivoire. They brought only the clothes on their backs, two sheep, four cooking pots, food for travel and a picture of their ancestors. The family traveled south and then west, finally settling in the rural community of Blolequin, where Ouedraogo’s father declared that he would support them as a cocoa farmer.

Ouedraogo’s family planted and then cultivated cocoa trees, and they built a new life for themselves. Ouedraogo came of age and eventually joined his father in the cocoa fields. Then in 2011, the Second Ivoirian Civil War broke out, leaving Blolequin in shambles with dozens killed, and forcing the family to retreat to Burkina Faso. Last year, as a measure of peace began to settle back over the land, Ouedraogo returned to Côte d’Ivoire.

“My heart, my loyalty and my livelihood lies among the shade of my cocoa trees and the blood red earth of Western Côte d’Ivoire,” explains Ouedraogo Boureima.

“My heart, my loyalty and my livelihood lies among the shade of my cocoa trees and the blood red earth of Western Côte d’Ivoire,” he explains. Now 31, Ouedraogo is carrying his father’s dream forward. It is a dream shared by more than 4.5 million people in Côte d’Ivoire, who depend on cocoa for their livelihoods. But as the Boureima family knows well, cocoa is an industry fraught with challenges, including price volatility, farmer exploitation, low wages and child labor, in a country plagued by political instability.

Despite the war’s end, political unrest continues to threaten Côte d’Ivoire’s cocoa crop—already under pressure from pests, fungi, unsustainable farming techniques, climate change and drought—while global cocoa demand climbs steadily at a rate of three percent a year. At the same time, increasingly low yields raise concerns about future cocoa shortages and hurt the incomes and aspirations of millions of Ivoirians.

In 2008, the Rainforest Alliance began to introduce socially, environmentally and economically sustainable practices to farmers in Côte d’Ivoire—helping farmers increase their yields and their profits, and improve their lives. Ouedraogo is one of tens of thousands of farmers in Côte d’Ivoire who have benefited from Rainforest Alliance certification.

In an effort to improve his family’s life, in 2011 he joined a cooperative of cocoa farmers working toward Rainforest Alliance certification. Many farmers in his community were initially skeptical of certification. The country’s history of violence and political unrest colored their perception; over the years, they had been approached by a number of NGOs offering aid, but in the end, they all failed to deliver on their promises. Desperate to support his family, Ouedraogo was willing to accept the possibility that certification would not pan out.

Ouedraogo Boureima (third row center, yellow shirt) with Rainforest Alliance staff and other members of the COABOB co-op.

Just one year later, Ouedraogo’s understanding of certification has evolved substantially. As with many farmers, it was initially talk of a price premium that attracted him. In actuality, certification does not guarantee a price premium, but higher yields resulting from the techniques promoted by the Rainforest Alliance have improved farmers lives. A 2012 study found that net income on Rainforest Alliance Certified farms in Côte d’Ivoire was 291 percent higher than on noncertified farms.

As Ouedraogo and other farmers have learned, however, higher incomes are just one aspect of the complex journey to sustainability. Now in its second year, Ouedraogo’s Rainforest Alliance Certified cooperative COABOB is composed of 798 farmers who have a much deeper understanding of the challenges and benefits of certification. It was a struggle, for example, for many farmers to accept certification requirements that prohibit the use of toxic agrochemicals and encourage the use of alternative methods to control pests and add nutrients to the soil. With decreasing yields, many farmers felt pressure to increase their use of pesticide and chemical fertilizers on cocoa trees “It takes the Rainforest Alliance training and an outside perspective to understand that these chemicals are not long term solutions,” explains Ouedraogo.

Certification has led to other on-farm improvements, as well. Through his work with the Rainforest Alliance, Ouedraogo learned to prune his trees (cutting away old, dead and diseased branches) and put a mixture of wood shavings and composted cocoa pods around the base of each cocoa tree (helping to keep the soil around the trees’ roots moist).  He has also planted a variety of trees on his farm to protect his cocoa from the sun and enrich his soil.

This year, Ouedraogo noticed that his trees had sprouted new, healthy growth. He is hopeful that his harvest will be larger as a result. If other certified farms in the country are any indication, he will get his wish. Certified cocoa farms in Côte d’Ivoire have produced 72 percent more than their uncertified counterparts.

“I am starting to believe that I can think long term, something that I have never been able to do before,” Ouedraogo says. “I want to practice farming techniques that will allow my son to have a future on this same land.” He feels hopeful knowing that there are consumers demanding certified products. “There are people who believe in what I am doing,” he says, smiling.  “This makes the world feel smaller and gives me pride in my work.”

Thanks to commitments from leading brands like Mars, Unilever, Kraft and Hershey, the Rainforest Alliance’s certification work in Côte d’Ivoire has experienced remarkable growth. Over the last six years, 85,000 Ivorian farms covering more than one million acres (410,000 hectares) have become Rainforest Alliance Certified.  Companies now recognize that environmental, social and economic sustainability are essential to securing the global cocoa supply—and that Rainforest Alliance certification can help to accomplish these goals.

Cattle and Conservation

Did you know that cattle ranches are responsible for more than three-quarters of all forest loss in the Brazilian Amazon and 18 percent of global greenhouse gas emissions? That’s why the Rainforest Alliance has begun working with cattle farmers in Latin America to protect wildlife habitat, minimize GHG emissions, and ensure that livestock are comfortable and well-treated.

 Watch a new video to discover our work with cattle ranchers!

From the Experts: Unilever Executive Continues His Reflection on the Future of Sustainabilty

Earlier this week, we published a thoughtful piece from Unilever’s chief executive Paul Polman. Here, Polman continues his reflection on the future of sustainable business and addresses the role of women in agriculture.

One key to breaking the relentless cycle of poverty and underdevelopment is supporting the role of women in agriculture. The FAO has recently published a report, which highlighted the fact that 43 percent of agricultural workers in developing nations are women.

Women have both the greatest responsibility and the fewest resources to ensure food for their communities.  Limited access to land, finance and training, together with cultural factors, constrain women’s ability to produce and deliver adequate nutrition for their families.

Yet all the evidence indicates that, if these women had the same access to resources as their male counterparts, they could increase yields on their farms by 20 to 30 percent, raise the total global agricultural output by 4 percent and reduce the number of hungry people in the world by 17 percent.

Alongside championing a more equitable role for women, we must also provide the tools and resources to realize agricultural change.  We must harness the latest technologies, whether mobile phones, irrigation systems or farm machinery, to connect rural communities and better enable farmers to produce crops in a sustainable way.

We must also ensure that governments play their part in delivering a sustainable future. At the Rio Earth Summit last year I saw how many now question the ability of international negotiations to agree binding treaties on issues such as sustainable development and climate change, but we must not let them off the hook so easily.

Government engagement remains key to creating the enabling environment and the right incentives to drive systems change in the long term,  There are indeed many political leaders who are making this a priority in their own countries and we should applaud them for doing so.

We must continue to foster public-private partnerships — such as Unilever’s collaboration with the Tanzanian government and other businesses to establish the

A group of female farmers gather in Ghana.

Southern Agricultural Growth Corridor of Tanzania, which aims to transform the area’s agricultural productivity.

Only by working collaboratively, by harnessing the joint resources, reach and energy of the public and private sectors, will we have the scale and impetus necessary to drive forward new models of sustainable production and consumption.

Industry-wide action — such as the Global Consumer Goods Forum’s commitment to end deforestation throughout the supply chain by 2020 — is also vital.  I was very pleased to be involved this year in the CGF’s agreement with the US Government to co-host a partnerships dialogue on public-private efforts to help realize this goal.

As a CEO, I know something about the importance of goals; of outlining a clear, measurable path to a target.

Goals form the basis of the Unilever Sustainable Living Plan.  They focus our energy, challenging us each day to do better, and strive harder to enable our suppliers, our consumers and our employees to build a more sustainable, equitable and inclusive future.

Over the last decade the Millennium Development Goals have provided a framework which has focused action on international development and poverty reduction.

While success has been uneven, we must recognize the tremendous impact that this shared vision has had on progress, prompting collaboration between NGOs, governments and progressive companies towards making a real and tangible difference to people and their communities.

Earlier this year I was honored to be asked by the United Nations Secretary General, Ban Ki-moon, to join the High Level Panel which is reviewing the MDGs and where we need to go next.  It is not an easy task to consider how a new set of goals might be structured in a way that takes account of all the urgent issues that now face us.

But what is clear to me is that we must all do more to recognize the intertwined nature of social, environment and economic sustainability:

• Poverty cannot be overcome while ignoring environmental degradation.

• Economic growth cannot only benefit the rich at the expense of the poor.

• Food and nutritional security cannot only be a matter of producing more food, but also ensuring that it is produced in a sustainable way and that it is distributed to those that need it most.

Let us inspire better care of our planet, by advancing knowledge of the natural world.  By inspiring those around us, we can reach the scale necessary to effect a sea change in the way we treat our planet and each other.

If we are to truly deliver the Rainforest Alliance’s vision of a world where “people and the environment prosper together” we must push back the boundaries of what others say is possible and instead focus on what is necessary.

The challenge is great, but so is the opportunity.  So let us not rest on our laurels. To paraphrase a line by the great British playwright George Bernard Shaw, and made famous by the US politician Robert F. Kennedy: “Some people see the world as it is and ask: what can I do? Young people see the world as it could be and say: together we can.”

The Champagne of Teas

Maya Albanese, sustainable agriculture associate, in a Darjeeling factory.

Back from a trip to India, Rainforest Alliance sustainable agriculture associate Maya Albanese writes…

The mighty snow-capped Himalayas provide an awe-inspiring backdrop to the bright green slopes of Darjeeling, blanketed with rows upon rows of meticulously pruned tea bushes. Here, women in colorful clothes scale the slopes carrying woven baskets overflowing with bountiful autumnal harvests.  Located at the northernmost tip of the state of West Bengal, the Golden Valley of Darjeeling is famous for its high-quality, high-altitude orthodox teas. With just 80 gardens planted in Darjeeling, the harvest is small and special in comparison to other tea growing regions of the world. Production of this “champagne of teas” is high cost and low output, and it commands a premium price on the international market.

Journey to Tumsong

In November of 2012, I had the pleasure of staying on Tumsong Tea Estate, a Rainforest Alliance Certified™ tea garden approximately 5,000 feet above sea level in Darjeeling. Tumsong was planted in 1867 around a temple dedicated to the Hindu goddess Tamsa Devi, who is worshipped by the indigenous people of the Golden Valley.  It is said that when you drink the delicate brew of Tumsong — known as “the garden of happy hearts” — you receive the blessing of the goddess herself.

I arrived in Tumsong by plane from Bagdogra airport followed by three hours on a precarious, winding road. As I traveled closer to the heart of Darjeeling, the lines

The Tumsong Tea Estate.

on the faces of the people around me changed dramatically. The majority of the local population is Gorkha (of ethnic Nepali background), and the tea pluckers are almost exclusively Nepali women. You will often see the word “Gorkhaland” above signs in Darjeeling, representative of the desire of some locals to see the region become an independent state.  There are a number of other indigenous ethnic groups in the area, including Sherpas, Bengalis, Anglo-Indians, Chinese, Biharis and Tibetans.

On a clear day, you can see an exceptional view of Kangchenjunga – the tallest mountain in India and the third highest in the world — from Tumsong. It’s proximity to the Himalayas generates a constant, cool breeze, making the tea buds grow gradually and saturating their leaves with a “muscatel” flavor.  This unique flavor, the result of small insects sucking juices from the stems of tea plants, is one of the reasons Darjeeling tea is so prized.

 Harvest Seasons of Darjeeling

In order to understand tea tasting and production better, one must become attuned to a garden’s “flushes” — harvest periods throughout the year which produce varying qualities of tea. Tea is plucked from the same tea bushes and processed with the same methods during each flush, but seasonal climate variations produce distinct flavors.

The first flush takes place in mid-March, after the spring rains have arrived and the tea bushes are a vibrant green color. A cup of first flush Darjeeling tea is light green in color and has a soft floral aroma with a mildly astringent taste.

Tea pluckers bring the autumnal flush to be weighed at Tumsong.

Just before the monsoon season begins in June, the second flush is harvested. A personal favorite of mine, the second flush tea is a bit darker in color with a stronger flavor and a mild fruit taste.

The final harvest, which had occurred just before my arrival at Tumsong, is called the autumnal flush and offers a rounded cup of scents and flavors. Because this flush occurs during the monsoon, the tea leaves are extra-large and make a brew that is coppery in color with the most full-bodied taste of all the flushes.

Protecting Biodiversity

Darjeeling is located in the Eastern Himalayan zoo-geographic zone, home to endemic rare plants like high elevation orchids and endangered animals such as one-horned rhinoceroses and snow leopards. Deforestation is a serious issue in the area, largely due to increasing demand for wood fuel and timber, and air pollution from traffic congestion in the towns.

The Tumsong Tea Factory.

Fortunately, Chamong Ltd — the company that owns Tumsong Estate – is an environmental champion with a strong commitment to sustainability and a number of certifications for environmental and social stewardship.  All of its gardens are managed with minimal to no pesticides and synthetic fertilizers, and several are Rainforest Alliance Certified.

Earning Rainforest Alliance Certification

In order to become Rainforest Alliance Certified, Tumsong went through a rigorous process to meet the Sustainable Agriculture Network (SAN) Standard, which covers waste and water management, integrated crop and pest management, and workers services and rights. It’s a challenging process in Darjeeling, particularly because erosion, pests and blights regularly affect the steep and variable terrain on which the tea is planted. Through collaborative work with the Rainforest Alliance, tea companies like Chamong are working to address these issues in a manner than is environmentally and economically sustainable.

Kanchenjunga Mountain, the third highest mountain in the world.

Enjoying Impeccable Hospitality

One of the best parts of the experience of staying at Tumsong Tea Estate is the hospitality. I stayed in the main tea house or ‘Chiabari,’ a gorgeous colonial mansion with porches facing the Himalayas, cozy fireplaces and a full-service kitchen. Particularly delightful is the tradition of bringing a tray of “bed tea” to your room each morning at the hour of your preference. The hospitality only added to an already remarkable experience in an exceptional setting.

Tourists who are interested in a first-hand experience of Rainforest Alliance Certified tea production in beautiful Darjeeling can reserve rooms at the Chiabari. Tumsong is a three-hour drive from Bagdogra airport in West Bengal and 18 miles from the town of Darjeeling, where visitors can enjoy a ride on the Darjeeling Himalayan Railway, a UNESCO World Heritage Site since 1999 and one of the only steam powered trains still operating in the world. 

Support for Voluntary Forest Carbon Markets at COP18

Campbell Moore, carbon specialist for the Rainforest Alliance, reports on developments in the voluntary carbon market at COP18.

Last week, I headed to Qatar to join the Rainforest Alliance’s climate team at COP18 and observe the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) negotiations.  In addition to providing a global platform to advance climate change policies and negotiations, the climate talks also serve as the world’s largest climate change trade fair, helping the Rainforest Alliance to spread the word about our important work and keep track of major developments concerning climate change and the world’s forests. One conversation that kept our attention: the emerging role of voluntary forest carbon standards and carbon markets.

Voluntary carbon markets continue to pioneer ways to leverage market forces for conservation, sustainability and climate change mitigation.  Forest carbon projects, including Afforestation and Reforestation (A/R), Improved Forest Management (IFM), and Reduced Emissions from Deforestation and Degradation (REDD) play a crucial role in demonstrating that carbon projects can have legitimate benefits for people, climate and the environment.

Indeed, the REDD+ Mechanism that the COP to the UNFCCC have been negotiating for several years is a concept tested first in voluntary carbon markets.  In recent years, REDD+ has been one of the most successful approaches for conserving forests and biodiversity, and offering benefits to forest-dependent communities to emerge from the yearly negotiations.

Unfortunately, this year’s COP18 includes a possible stalling of REDD+ negotiations.  If talks conclude at a standstill, the voluntary carbon markets will continue to pave the way for some time. However, for REDD to succeed, the UNFCCC must accomplish more and more quickly. The finance needed to cut deforestation in half by 2030 is unlikely without an internationally agreed upon REDD framework. Nonetheless, there is much to be gained from the experience of private sector investment in voluntary forest carbon projects, which has broken innovative ground since the emergence of voluntary carbon standards.

For example, in 2012 VCS  – the current market leader — developed guidance on how to incorporate individual projects into scaled up national and regional initiatives.  Since nested REDD plans seems essential for effective execution, such guidance is extremely beneficial to the UNFCCC. Innovative and complex new methodologies, standards and guidance have also been developed for imperiled and high-carbon forest ecosystems like peat swamp forests and mangroves.  There is also an increased appreciation for the need to establish robust safeguards in these projects to ensure benefits to biodiversity and communities, evidenced by the great number of events on this topic often led by the Climate, Community, and Biodiversity Alliance.

As one of the leading auditors of forest carbon projects, the Rainforest Alliance helps to bring legitimacy and validity to this market.  From US to Peru and Madagascar to Indonesia, our auditors ensure that on the ground these projects have the utmost benefits for people, the environment and our global climate.

Part I: What Can We Learn From Brazil?

Chad Trewick is senior director of coffee and tea at Caribou Coffee – the first major coffee company in the US to source 100 percent of its coffee from Rainforest Alliance Certified™ farms. Here, he writes about a recent trip to Brazil to explore sustainable coffee production.

Brazil is a generation (maybe even two or three) ahead of the rest of the coffee-producing world in terms of technology, efficiency, sustainability and productivity per area. In fact, practices in the world’s most important coffee-producing country could pave the way for sustainable coffee production globally, securing a steady supply in the face of climate change, volatility and land-use pressures. The country is not, however, impervious to those changes; this year, folks in Brazil experienced the first June rainfall in collective memory, causing quality compromises and headaches for everyone involved in coffee production.

As part of an ongoing project with the Rainforest Alliance designed to determine the measurable benefits and value of certification, I embarked on a trip with the organization’s Sustainable Agriculture Network partner in Brazil, Imaflora. The goal was to see and understand innovations and best practices in sustainability, and to share these with producers and exporters in other countries.

On our way to our first stop, Rodrigo Cascalles of Imaflora and I discussed how we can determine the objective “value” of certification. It should come as no surprise that typically the top motivation for certification is the price premium a producer can receive. But while the financial benefit is huge incentive, other reasons weigh heavily, too.

Leaders in Environmental Law

Brazilian social and environmental laws are nearly unparalleled in agriculture. Twenty percent of a producer’s land must be set aside as a forest reserve; waterways are strictly protected; and rigid social laws governing labor conditions and services abound.

According Imaflora, complying with Brazilian regulations will bring any law-abiding producer as much as 90 percent of the way to certification! (For comparison, picture the agricultural landscape in the US — we plant crops right up to just about any body of water, roadway or abode.) A few months ago, however, laws changed and the waterway protection rules became dependent on the size of the river or lake. In some cases, less protection is now required. New laws also reward producers who exceed their requirements for natural reserves, permitting them to receive payment from other producers who need to comply with the reserve area requirements.

Protectors of People

Farmers also speak of the rigorous social requirements imposed by the government. Any worker who steps onto a farm to work must first receive a baseline medical exam. The government also mandates worker housing, setting minimum standards for the exact space each worker is allotted, the size and thickness of his mattresses (including its distance from the ceiling and the space between mattresses), and the layout of bathroom facilities and eating areas. Conditions in the field are also carefully defined: sunscreen must be available for use; arms and necks must be covered by clothing; drinking water must be available; a shade tent must be provided; portable toilets must be on site, and ankles need to be covered to protect from snakes. Compared to conditions I see regularly on farms in other countries, these mandates are absolutely amazing — but, as I was reminded several times, it is also a lot for a producer to be held accountable for.

Rainforest Alliance Certification in Brazil

Producers pointed out that the government is much less likely to inspect and enforce national regulations on a Rainforest Alliance Certified farm because they know that the farm must be in compliance in order to be certified.  However, because Rainforest Alliance certification requires compliance with all local mandates, the cost of production for law-abiding and certified producers is actually significantly higher than the national average. We need to continuously highlight the benefits of certification — and not only the incremental costs  – in conversations with all members of the supply chain. The cost of certification shouldn’t overshadow the very real on-the-ground benefits. The fact that Rainforest Alliance Certified farms are considered the best places to work for a laborer highlights the better conditions on these farms.

Farmers also receive a sought-after premium for their Rainforest Alliance Certified coffee. And, when they implement production efficiencies, they can maximize these premiums.

The record-keeping and continuous improvement requirements mandated by the Rainforest Alliance provide tangible productivity benefits. A producer’s logged activities are studied and evaluated annually so that they can improve their conditions and reduce their resource usage.

Certification also results in improvements in flora and fauna. Most farmers I spoke with truly celebrated (in an unsolicited way) all of the species and the natural elements that are returning to their farms and, in some cases, even benefiting their operations. They told me about native bird species, increased wild boar sightings, and diversified native species planted in forest reserves. This appreciation of nature is being passed to future generations and the broader community, and helping to create a culture with a deeper respect for nature.

Certified farms are also required to be responsible members of their communities. Many are involved in school improvement projects and clean-up efforts, and place a great emphasis on educating students about the importance of caring for the environment. This can be a particularly effective tool for educating adults. Children of farm workers can take messages home and begin the process of educating their parents. Students also learn to be better guardians of their limited resources. At one school, for example, students were asked to turn trash into usable items to demonstrate that most things can (and should) be more than single-use.

Cooperatives in Brazil

As in many other countries, cooperatives in Brazil can provide an opportunity for increased efficiency because producers are working with greater crop volume. And through their technical assistance programs, many cooperatives are actively encouraging certification.

I visited one coop on a multi-year plan toward 100 percent certification among its members by 2014. Another coop was working toward 70 to 80 percent certification by the end of next year.  This widespread certification support among coops is a great endorsement and empowers producers to make the decision to pursue certification.

Check back to read part II of Chad’s blog from Brazil.