FROM THE EDITOR

A FEW WEEKS AGO, I noticed a large sign in the window of my neighborhood Starbucks. Big black letters read: Starbucks Relationship with Ethiopian Coffee Farmers! I leaned closer to read the first sentence, “You may have recently seen Starbucks in the media with respect to Ethiopia and trademark issues.” The note went on to discredit Oxfam’s claims that Starbucks was purposefully keeping money from Ethiopian coffee farmers.
     The dispute, for once, doesn’t have anything to do with whether or not Starbucks is buying fair-trade coffee or if it’s paying farmers fairly. The dispute instead, is over the Ethiopian government’s desire to trademark its coffee.
     The Ethiopia trademark issue, like so many in coffee, isn’t easy to sort out. I had to wade through both sides of the issue, as well as the legalese before I could even begin to make sense of it. As I understand it, everything began when the Ethiopian government submitted a trademark application to the U.S. Patent and Trademark (USPTO) office for three of its best-known beans: Sidamo, Harrar and Yirgacheffe. A blocking bid was put in by the National Coffee Association (NCA). A letter of opposition was also filed, and then pulled by the SCAA. Shortly thereafter, the USPTO denied the application for Sidamo and Harrar. Now, British charity Oxfam has accused Starbucks of being behind the action, and thus denying farmers potential income from their coffee. While this fact has been widely publicized, there has been nothing linking Starbucks to the opposition letters filed by the SCAA and NCA.
     While the accusation is making press-waves everywhere, and is getting even the least informed coffee consumer to utter phrases like “trademark” and “Harrar,” there is another issue behind the Starbucks/NCA/Oxfam argument. An issue of real importance: the effect that an Ethiopian trademark—and any successive trademarks if they’re approved—would have on coffee farmers.
     Depending on who you talk to, the trademark could have one of two effects. According to the Ethiopian government, the trademark would allow the country to control the use of its beans in the marketplace, ideally giving the farmers a better price for the coffee. Under this scenario, it has been estimated that Ethiopia’s coffee industry could earn an additional $88 million per year.
     From a legal perspective, however, the effect is not quite as clear, nor as positive. The purpose of trademark law is to prevent confusion over brand names—and, according to trademark law, Harrar and Sidamo are not brand names. Instead, they signify growing regions or the name of coffee grown in those regions. This would mean that the terms would be eligible, most likely without refute, to become “certification marks” or “geographic indications.” Certification marks, such as Jamaican Blue Mountain and 100-percent Kona, identify the coffee’s source by indicating the nature and quality of the coffee and by affirming that the coffee has met certain standards. Geographic indications serve similar functions as trademarks by guaranteeing quality, identifying source and ideally increasing the value of the product. Certification marks are the route that the SCAA recommends to producer organizations and is willing to assist them in this effort.
     Which essentially brings us back to the larger question of why the Ethiopian government applied for trademarks instead of certification marks. Was it a simple misunderstanding that has now escalated into a word-war between an international charity organization and one of the biggest coffee companies in the world? Or do trademarks offer a benefit that is somehow missing in the certification marks?
     It will take more time and more than a few lawyers to sort it all out, I have a feeling. In the meantime, I find it disheartening to realize that while the big guys take potshots at each other and the coffee-buying public tries to find footing on one side or the other, it is the farmers who have once again gotten left out of the coffee equation. And isn’t this all supposed to be about them, about putting them front and center, about giving them more control and knowledge and money? It seems that every time the industry crosses one hurdle, it comes upon another one. My only hope is that we’re learning each time, and that each hurdle will get easier to overcome.

     Keep the flame burning,
     Shanna