Junta Nacional del Café (National Coffee Board)

 

15 years developing the Peruvian coffee industry 

 ACHIEVEMENTS, CHALLENGES AND COMMITMENTS 

 

 

In 1993, our coffee plantation regions were plagued by subversive violence, causing, among other evils, the dismantling of cooperatives and the migration of thousands of agricultural families to other regions. The price of coffee paid to producers had been at its lowest for several years. At that time, the country exported 1 million 58 thousand quintals for a value of US$ 60 million dollars.

 

That was when, with the aim of overcoming this social and political crisis, the associations grouping coffee grower cooperatives formed the National Coffee Board (JNC), as an institution that would represent and defend the interests of coffee growers. It was founded on January 6, 1993. From that day on, 15 years ago, the JNC has been working tirelessly to develop the Peruvian coffee industry.

 

In 2008, our country will become the world’s 6^th largest aromatic grain exporter and the world’s top exporter of organic coffee and specialty coffees. To achieve this we will have to export more than 600 million dollars worth of coffee, that is 10 times more than in 1993. Among other contributions, we will contribute 45 million daily wages to coffee production and harvesting.

 

These advances have been possible thanks to the efforts of 150 thousand coffee growing families and thousands of leaders and technical specialists of the 59 cooperatives and 240 associations grouped in the JNC, who took on the tasks of improving the quality of the product, transforming conventional coffee plantations to organic and sustainable methods, and regenerating and preserving biodiversity in the hillsides of our inter-Andean valleys.

 

The coffee exported to the international market by our 28 cooperatives obtained FOB prices above the national mean registered by Customs. Moreover, our cooperatives have been making significant investments in machinery and industrial equipment, promoting Peruvian coffee around the world, and diversifying family income. They receive technical assistance from 98 professionals working in the field, who also provide support in cooperative business management. All of these advances have been achieved in spite of an obstructionist State that hinders the business development of family-based coffee production. To such an extent is the government obstructionist that the Minister of Agriculture, Ismael Benavides, is rashly and imprudently seeking to discredit the efforts of thousands of small coffee growers who built the first coffee cooperatives 45 years ago.

 

By working in cooperatives and associations, we are more effective in reducing extreme poverty in the Sierra and Selva regions, combating the illegal economy and contributing to secure social peace in our country. We are, therefore, the vanguard of associativity in Peruvian agriculture, WITH SUCCESSFUL RESULTS, in spite of the adverse political, ideological, economic and taxing conditions.

 

In these 15 years of fighting against adversities, we have also learnt significant lessons. There is no time to lose, and it is now, when we have reached our institutional maturity, that we must tackle new challenges, such as developing and implementing effective policies aimed at attaining competitiveness and profitability, both economically and socially, in the 338 rural districts and 67 provinces devoted to coffee growing.

 

With this in mind, we have committed ourselves to:

 

1) Developing an institutional framework for coffee production, with independence and executive roles, in line with the country’s process of regionalization.

2) Implementing measures to enhance productivity and quality.

3) Formalizing the activities of small coffee growers and establishing business associations among them.

4) Promoting legal economic activities in the regions afflicted by violence.

5) Incorporating the Selva region to government promotion programs similar to the ones in the Sierra.

6) Incorporating coffee as a flagship product and carrying out promotion actions, in coordination with legitimate institutions that represent the coffee chain.

    7) Formalizing the land ownership of producers and conducting a general registration, among other measures that the JNC has been proposing for years..

 

THERE IS NO TOMORROW WITHOUT COFFEE

            MORE COFFEE……MORE COUNTRY

 

                   Cesar Rivas Peña

President of the Governing Committee of the JNC

Lima, January 7, 2008