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Today's
Stories
January 6, 2004
David Price
"Like
Slaves": Anthropological Notes on Occupation
January 5, 2004
Al Krebs
How
Now Mad Cow!
Kathy Kelly
Squatting
in Baghdad's Bomb Craters
Jordy Cummings
The Dialectic of the Kristol Family: Putting the Neo in the Cons
Fran Shor
Mad Human Disease: Chewing the Fat Down on the Farm
Fidel Castro
"We Shall Overcome": On the 45th Anniversary of the
Cuban Revolution
Gary Leupp
North
Korea for Dummies
January 3 / 4, 2004
Brian Cloughley
Never
Mind the WMDs, Just Look at History
Vice Admiral Jack Shanahan
The Wrong War at the Wrong Time
William Cook
Failing to Respond to 9/11
Glen Martin
Jesus
vs. the Beast of the Apocalypse
Robert Fisk
Iraqi Humor Amid the Carnage
Ilan Pappe
The Geneva Bubble
Walter Davis
Robert Jay Lifton, or Nostalgia
Kurt Nimmo
Ashcroft vs. the Left
Mike Whitney
The Padilla Case
Steven Sherman
On Wallerstein's The Decline of American Power
Dave Lindorff
Bush's Taiwan Hypocrisy
William Blum
Codework Orange!
Mitchel Cohen
Learning from Che Guevara
Seth Sandronsky
Mad Cow and Main Street USA
Bruce Jackson
Conversations with Leslie Fiedler
Standard Schaefer
Poet Carl Rakosi Turns 100
Ron Jacobs
Sir Mick
Adam Engel
Hall of Hoaxes
Poets' Basement
Jones, Albert & Curtis
January 2, 2004
Stan Cox
Red Alert
2016
Dave Lindorff
Beef, the Meat of Republicans
Jackie Corr
Rule and Ruin: Wall Street and Montana
Norman Solomon
George Will's Ethics: None of Our Business?
David Vest
As the Top Wobbleth
January 1, 2004
Randall Robinson
Honor
Haiti, Honor Ourselves
David Krieger
Looking
Back on 2003
Robert Fisk
War Takes an Inhuman Twist: Roadkill Bombs
Stan Goff
War,
Race and Elections
Hammond Guthrie
2003 Almaniac
Website of the Day
Embody Bags
December 31, 2003
Ray McGovern
Don't
Be Fooled Again: This Isn't an Independent Investigation
Kurt Nimmo
Manufacturing Hysteria
Robert Fisk
The Occupation is Damned
Mike Whitney
Mad Cows and Downer George
Alexander Cockburn
A Great Year Ebbed, Another Ahead
December 30, 2003
Michael Neumann
Criticism
of Israel is Not Anti-Semitism
Annie Higgins
When
They Bombed the Hometown of the Virgin Mary
Alan Farago
Bush Bros. Wrecking Co.: Time Runs Out for the Everglades
Dan Bacher
Creatures from the Blacklight Lagoon: From Glofish to Frankenfish
Jeffrey St. Clair
Hard
Time on the Killing Floor: Inside Big Meat
Willie Nelson
Whatever Happened to Peace on Earth?
December 29, 2003
Mark Hand
The Washington
Post in the Dock?
David Lindorff
The
Bush Election Strategy
Phillip Cryan
Interested Blindness: Media Omissions in Colombia's War
Richard Trainor
Catellus Development: the Next Octopus?
Uri Avnery
Israel's
Conscientious Objectors
December 27 / 28, 2003
Alexander Cockburn
A
Journey Into Rupert Murdoch's Soul
Kathy Kelly
Christmas Day in Baghdad: A Better World
Saul Landau
Iraq
at the End of the Year
Dave Zirin
A Linebacker for Peace & Justice: an Interview with David
Meggysey
Robert Fisk
Iraq
Through the American Looking Glass
Scott Burchill
The Bad Guys We Once Thought Good: Where Are They Now?
Chris Floyd
Bush's Iraq Plan is Right on Course: Saddam 2.0
Brian J. Foley
Don't Tread on Me: Act Now to Save the Constitution
Seth Sandronsky
Feedlot Sweatshops: Mad Cows and the Market
Susan Davis
Lord
of the (Cash Register) Rings
Ron Jacobs
Cratched Does California
Adam Engel
Crumblecake and Fish
Norman Solomon
The Unpardonable Lenny Bruce
Poets' Basement
Cullen and Albert
Website of the Weekend
Activism Through Music
December 26, 2003
Gary Leupp
Bush
Doings: Doing the Language
December 25, 2003
Diane Christian
The
Christmas Story
Elaine Cassel
This
Christmas, the World is Too Much With Us
Susan Davis
Jinglebells, Hold the Schlock
Kristen Ess
Bethlehem Celebrates Christmas, While Rafah Counts the Dead
Francis Boyle
Oh Little Town of Bethlehem
Alexander Cockburn
The
Magnificient 9
Guthrie / Albert
Another Colorful Season
December 24, 2003
M. Shahid Alam
The Semantics
of Empire
William S. Lind
Marley's
List for Santa in Wartime
Josh Frank
Iraqi
Oil: First Come, First Serve
Cpt. Paul Watson
The
Mad Cowboy Was Right
Robert Lopez
Nuance
and Innuendo in the War on Iraq
December 23, 2003
Brian J. Foley
Duck
and Cover-up
Will Youmans
Sharon's
Ultimatum
Michael Donnelly
Here
They Come Again: Another Big Green Fiasco
Uri Avnery
Sharon's
Speech: the Decoded Version
December 22, 2003
Jeffrey St. Clair
Pray
to Play: Bush's Faith-Based National Parks
Patrick Gavin
What Would Lincoln Do?
Marjorie Cohn
How to
Try Saddam: Searching for a Just Venue
Kathy Kelly
The
Two Troublemakers: "Guilty of Being Palestinians in Iraq"
December 20 / 21, 2003
Alexander Cockburn
How
to Kill Saddam
Saul Landau
Bush Tries Farce as Cuba Policy
Rafael Hernandez
Empire and Resistance: an Interview with Tariq Ali
David Vest
Our Ass and Saddam's Hole
Kurt Nimmo
Bush
Gets Serious About Killing Iraqis
Greg Weiher
Lessons from the Israeli School on How to Win Friends in the
Islamic World
Christopher Brauchli
Arrest, Smear, Slink Away: Dr. Lee and Cpt. Yee
Carol Norris
Cheers of a Clown: Saddam and the Gloating Bush
Bruce Jackson
The Nameless and the Detained: Bush's Disappeared
Juliana Fredman
A Sealed Laboratory of Repression
Mickey Z.
Holiday Spirit at the UN
Ron Jacobs
In the Wake of Rebellion: The Prisoner's Rights Movement and
Latino Prisoners
Josh Frank
Sen. Max Baucus: the Slick Swindler
John L. Hess
Slow Train to the Plane
Adam Engel
Black is Indeed Beautiful
Ben Tripp
The Relevance of Art in Times of Crisis
Michael Neumann
Rhythm and Race
Poets' Basement
Cullen, Engel, Albert & Guthrie
Hot Stories
Alexander Cockburn
Behold,
the Head of a Neo-Con!
Subcomandante Marcos
The
Death Train of the WTO
Norman Finkelstein
Hitchens
as Model Apostate
Steve Niva
Israel's
Assassination Policy: the Trigger for Suicide Bombings?
Dardagan,
Slobodo and Williams
CounterPunch Exclusive:
20,000 Wounded Iraqi Civilians
Steve
J.B.
Prison Bitch
Sheldon
Rampton and John Stauber
True Lies: the Use of Propaganda
in the Iraq War
Wendell
Berry
Small Destructions Add Up
CounterPunch
Wire
WMD: Who Said What When
Cindy
Corrie
A Mother's Day Talk: the Daughter
I Can't Hear From
Gore Vidal
The
Erosion of the American Dream
Francis Boyle
Impeach
Bush: A Draft Resolution
Click Here
for More Stories.
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January
6, 2004
Ground Down in the
Fields
Coffee
and State Authority in Colombia
By JOSH FRANK
The global coffee industry has endured colossal
changes over the past fifty years. Production of beans has shifted
from country to country.
Profiteering from the product has increased
almost exponentially through huge sales at retail outlets such
as Starbucks and Seattle's Best. But not all involved in the
coffee market have benefited equally. Small coffee farmers have
suffered tremendous loss. Environmental degradation has also
increased as ancient forests have been cleared in hopes that
the bare land can be transformed into fertile ground, worthy
of growing cash crops. Countries have lost entire export industries
as multinational corporations race to purchase the cheapest beans
they can find. And no country has felt the pain of these transformations
greater than Colombia.
In the mid-1970s coffee in Colombia accounted
for 50% of their legal exports. During the global craze of the
1990s, as retail shops opened up on street corners throughout
the industrialized world, Colombia's coffee industry bottomed
out. By 1995, the country's coffee industry had suffered tremendously.
Coffee dropped from 50 to 7% of Colombia's legal exports. Thousands
of farmers fled the country, many more traded coffee for more
lucrative crops such as coca and opium. And oil has now replaced
coffee as the number one legal export, even though coffee farmers
continue to employ the most workers of any industry in the country.
Coffee prices in South America peaked
during the late 1960s to 1970s, a pound of coffee from the fields
of Columbia sold at an average of $3 per pound. But by October
2001, the price of coffee per pound had dropped to $0.62 per
pound.
The Colombian market at the time was
regulated by The Colombia Coffee Federation (FNC); a quasi labor
union that represented coffee producers.
The organization was founded in 1928,
and quickly became the political voice for rural farmers who
had little clout and minimal access to policy makers.
Almost all coffee farmers were benefiting
during those lucrative years.
Agriculture was the business to be in
if you wanted to make a safe living in Colombia. However, these
boom years didn't last long.
The FNC since the 1970s has lost its
once formidable power. Global demands have fractured the coffee
community in Colombia through multiple trade factors, often referred
to as the neoliberal model. This economic model draws on the
old meaning of the word "liberal". It includes endorsing
the free-market system; deregulation of sectors, privatization,
and an overall disregard for government oversight and taxation.
Now known to many in the US as Clintonomics, where President
Clinton pushed through NAFTA and fully endorsed the WTO and IMF.
As more and more farmers began producing
coffee beans (estimates ranged from 750,000 to 900,000 farms
in 1972), prices began to steadily decline. Well over 200,000
farms were lost by the mid-1990s, as the oversupply of coffee
in Colombia reached record highs. Colombia was not alone in its
over-production of beans. In late 2001 it was reported that 60
countries produced 132 million pound bags of coffee, but the
world only consumed 108 million bags.
Free-markets ruled the international
coffee trade during the 1980s. Major multinational buyers like
Nestle, Phillip Morris, and Proctor and Gamble raced to the bottom
of the price chain. They looked to profit by buying the most
inexpensive beans they could find. Colombia was sure to lose,
as their beans were traditionally known for high quality and
gourmet flavor. Production costs were also relatively high for
a third-world country. The power of the FNC traditionally had
raised the standard of living for the estimated 500,000 coffee
farms in Colombia. Any drop in their per pound production costs
would greatly impact these farmers' standards of living.
Nevertheless, neoliberalism dictated
the next winner in the world of coffee. Following the 1973 Paris
Peace Accords, Vietnam quickly came into focus as a potential
mass producer of cheap beans. Farm wages in Vietnam has always
been rock-bottom; in 1980 the average farm worker there made
$0.09 a day.
The climate in Vietnam was also ideal
for producing beans, and the world market was more than ready
to capitalize on these prime conditions.
Free-market economists would argue this
is standard supply and demand economics. The world's demand was
flourishing, so it was only right for buyers to seek out the
cheapest means of production. However, what this model fails
to recognize is the harsh effects such policies have on small
farmers in rural areas throughout the world. The numbers show
this neoliberal failure with a sobering jolt.
By 1999 Vietnam nudged its way into the
top three global producers of coffee. They tied with Colombia
as the second largest producer at 12 million bags per year, trailing
only Brazil. One decade prior, Vietnam was a virtual no name
on the world coffee circuit. Now they hope to one day topple
Brazil.
As the neoliberal model created some
winners, it has also produced many more losers. Transnational
corporations and gourmet coffee dealers have posted record profits,
as the price per pound has dramatically slumped. The largest
victors in this market have been the retail chain Starbucks,
and the largest multinational coffee buyer Nestle. As these corporations'
bottom lines fatten, rural poverty in the countries they harvest
is growing.
International coffee prices have now
reached a 35 year low. The last 3 years have been the hardest
on the global market, decreasing in value more than 50%. Taking
into account inflation, the prices are lower than they have ever
been in history.
Currently Colombia has $34 billion dollars
in external debt. Because of this, the International Monetary
Fund and World Bank dictate how best Colombia can pay back these
dues. The debt has forced the country to expand production of
exports to generate hard currency in order to pay back the loans.
This macro-expansion has contributed to the overproduction of
coffee beans, and a weakening of real wages. And the global demand
for coffee has remained relatively stable since the 1980s, but
the increase in production has yielded a massive oversupply of
coffee beans. Unlike the subsidized agriculture in the US --
Colombia is not able to dump their goods on other countries --
the beans simply go to waste.
Under the guise of neoliberalism, restrictions
on supply are nonexistent.
No regulatory measures are in place to
halt the overproduction of coffee in Colombia. The impact has
been horrific, as export revenues for multinational corporations
have grown, real wage earnings for farmers has stagnated.
As the Colombian government fully endorsed
these trade measures, their culpability in the debacle goes without
question. However, industrialized countries, policy institutions
like the IMF, and multinationals like Starbucks have in effect
spearheaded the pace of globalization in the developing world.
It has not been these countries governments alone.
Coffee beans since the early 1900s have
been primarily an export commodity.
Reliance on free-markets to dictate the
flow of coffee, has been the famous mantra Colombians use when
discussing supply and demand strategies. The FNC has historically
monitored Colombian coffee markets, with an eye toward the industrialized
future. As the FNC allowed multinationals to dictate production,
they lost control of the coffee trade. In the past the coffee
industry in Columbia relied on the FNC for regulatory measures
more than they relied on the State government. So it can be said
that the FNC has acted as a puppeteer for thousands of coffee
farmers in Colombia since its inception early last century. And
that puppeteer handed over the strings to the IMF and Nestle.
Now, third-world markets are managed
more by transnational corporations and policy institutions, than
State capacities. The development of economic transactions across
borders, particularly international borders, undermines State
autonomy. This in effect marginalizes the State and the FNC as
an economic player in the global community. And the loser is
the small farmer.
The neoliberal economy encourages private
entities to dictate the flow of goods and capital. Therefore
wealth and power has been transferred into the hands of private
actors from the clutches of the FNC and the State. Such private
actors decide who is included and excluded in global production
networks. In the case of Colombia, as the FNC and the State allowed
private players to manage the flow of coffee, they also became
more and more irrelevant in countering the strong race-to-the-bottom
market forces. The negative effects have been felt tremendously
by the poor agricultural communities in Colombia.
As statelessness embodies these sectors,
it becomes clearer and clearer that no governing organization
is wholly representing these poor Colombian farmers. Left to
the devices of neoliberalism alone, it is unlikely that coffee
production in Colombia will again make up 50% of the legal export.
It is also unlikely that the transfer of coffee to coca will
decrease any time soon. Farmers simply want and need to make
a living. Collectively, the strength of the new market is embodied
by multinational corporations and private players, not State
and local authorities -- sovereignty kneels to capitalism once
again.
All in all, this indicates that free-market
economics are powerful enough to benefit a few, as well as strong
enough to crush the rest.
Josh Frank
can be reached at: frank_joshua@hotmail.com
Weekend
Edition Features for January 3 / 4, 2004
Brian Cloughley
Never
Mind the WMDs, Just Look at History
Vice Admiral Jack Shanahan
The Wrong War at the Wrong Time
William Cook
Failing to Respond to 9/11
Glen Martin
Jesus
vs. the Beast of the Apocalypse
Robert Fisk
Iraqi Humor Amid the Carnage
Ilan Pappe
The Geneva Bubble
Walter Davis
Robert Jay Lifton, or Nostalgia
Kurt Nimmo
Ashcroft vs. the Left
Mike Whitney
The Padilla Case
Steven Sherman
On Wallerstein's The Decline of American Power
Dave Lindorff
Bush's Taiwan Hypocrisy
William Blum
Codework Orange!
Mitchel Cohen
Learning from Che Guevara
Seth Sandronsky
Mad Cow and Main Street USA
Bruce Jackson
Conversations with Leslie Fiedler
Standard Schaefer
Poet Carl Rakosi Turns 100
Ron Jacobs
Sir Mick
Adam Engel
Hall of Hoaxes
Poets' Basement
Jones, Albert & Curtis
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