New World Outlook - Summer 2017 - Open - 44

44 N E W W O R L D O U T L O O K . O R G

S O FA a n d B i o Fo o d s

Alternatives to Plantation Tea
Equal Exchange

here are alternatives to buying tea from plantations. In Sri Lanka, the Small Organic Farmers'
Association (SOFA) sells tea in the United States
through Equal Exchange, an alternative trade organization and partner in UMCOR's fair trade project.
SOFA was founded in 1993 with the vision to establish
a prosperous community of smallholding farmers living in
harmony with the environment. It has grown to include
more than 1,600 members who farm almost 6,000 acres
of land organically, growing a diversity of foods and cash
crops including cinnamon, ginger, nutmeg, and vanilla. Their
most important crop is tea, of
which they produce about 175 Members of the Small Organic Farmers' Association (SOFA) pose with
tons a year.
Deepak Khandelwal and Phyllis Robinson of Equal Exchange in Sri
SOFA partners with Bio Lanka. PHOTO: COURTESY EQUAL EXCHANGE
Foods, a Sri Lankan company
whose mission is to provide market access to small organized cooperatives. Some are cofarmers so that they can stay on the land, provide operatives of small holders banding tostrong livelihoods for their families, and maintain gether to process and sell their crops,
healthy and vibrant communities. BioFoods is the like SOFA, the Fair Trade Alliance of
processor and packer for all of SOFA's teas.
Kerala, India, or the Wuppertal Rooibos
Cooperative in South Africa. Another
Equal Exchange worker Deepak
alternative is the Potong Tea Garden in
The Dominant Tea Culture
Khandelwal tests tea varieties in the
Darjeeling, India, where the workers
Small
farmer
cooperatives
are
rare
in
the
tea
inJames Valley Organic Tea Factory, Small
on an abandoned plantation bought
dustry,
which
was
built
on
the
colonial
plantation
Organic Farmers' Association (SOFA), Sri
Lanka. PHOTO: PHYLLIS ROBINSON
system, a vast, monocultural cultivation, process- the land and farm it collectively.
United Methodists can find the
ing, and trading infrastructure so deeply rooted
that it remains largely unchanged today. Like the other imperial plantation tea produced by these pioneers on
crops-sugar, cotton, or tobacco-tea plantations depend on cheap labor. In Equal Exchange's online store: shop.
a feudal manner, tea growers imported whole families to work, live, and be equalexchange.coop/tea, and
dependent on their plantations. Descendants of these families are still there, learn more about their struggles at
https://equalexchange.coop/blog/
working the same estates.
building-democracy-in-tea.

Solidarity with Small Farmers

Considering the dominance of this system, it is surprising that Equal Exchange has
been able to find democratic farmer cooperatives to trade with. Even in the Fair
Trade world, most of the certified fair trade tea on supermarket shelves comes
from plantations. Equal Exchange, however, has been seeking out the pioneers
who are finding models to transform the plantation system into democratically

Equal Exchange and the United Methodist Committee on Relief (UMCOR)
have partnered since 2002 to offer United Methodists fair-trade alternatives
through the UMCOR Coffee Program.

http://www.newworldoutlook.org http://shop.equalexchange.coop/tea http://shop.equalexchange.coop/tea https://equalexchange.coop/blog/building-democracy-in-tea https://equalexchange.coop/blog/building-democracy-in-tea

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of New World Outlook - Summer 2017 - Open