Geoff Watts spent most of a month traversing Peru, Bolivia and Nicaragua.
He was no tourist. As the green-coffee buyer for Intelligentsia, the Chicago coffee company, Watts was scouting for coffee, checking the progress of beans being grown by small farmers in those countries and destined for Intelligentsia's Chicago stores.
One such coffee is Cruz del Sur, grown in the Peruvian town of Tingo Maria. It's the second year the company has offered Cruz del Sur, one in a growing number of what the company calls its "direct trade" coffees, the product of a three-year relationship with farmers in Tingo Maria.
Many of us have heard the term "fair trade" -- an international certification guaranteeing that farmers cooperatives get a minimum price for their coffee.
Intelligentsia's direct trade program, as company founder Doug Zell sees it, goes beyond that, guaranteeing a higher price -- at least 25 percent higher than the fair trade price, often more -- and working directly with individual farmers.
Most coffee that Americans drink is produced by small-scale farmers working for meager wages in some of the world's poorest countries, where rain forests have been stripped so coffee can grow quickly in full sun.
Watts travels the globe to talk with farmers face-to-face and explain the direct trade program. He visits individual farms at least three times a year, observing how they work their land and what their living conditions are like, among other things.
"If you want to begin talking about sustainability, you really have to look at economic stability," Watts said. "Is the farmer getting paid enough to invest in his business? And then you have to look at environmental issues. It goes far beyond whether or not there's shade."
