Why Mark Darcy is full of beans for the latest fair-trade coffee venture,
Sunday Herald, London, United Kingdom 5/19/05

The World's first chain of fair trade coffee shops, Progreso, was launched last year by Oxfam and Scottish coffee merchant, Matthew Algie.

Progreso aims to redress the gross imbalance that has emerged in the coffee industry, which sees a handful of roasters and multinational coffee retailers raking in hundreds of millions of pounds while the world's 25 million coffee growers typically make 1p on every latte sold.

The company buys its coffee from growers' co-operatives in Honduras, Ethiopia and Indonesia at a price which covers production costs. The co-operatives also own 25% of Progreso, which means they share in profits; and a further 25% is ringfenced for investment in disenfranchised growers that haven't been able to set up their own co-operative.

Fair trade is at the heart of the Make Poverty History campaign, which has been widely publicised by Oxfam and leads up to the G8 summit at Gleneagles in July.