CSR: Paying Price For Coffee
A cup of coffee is what it takes to be able to wake up and start the day for many of us. But what is the cost of that one cup of our beloved bitter concoction?
Coffee is world’s second largest tradable commodity after oil. It is a multimillion dollar global industry and is constantly growing. Tom Grant, a journalism professor at Abraham Baldwin Agricultural College and director of the documentary “Elephants in the Coffee,” said in the last 30 years, India’s coffee industry has doubled. As a result, coffee plantations have taken over the natural habitats of many animals.
Karnataka produces about 70% of country’s coffee. In order to meet demands of this burgeoning industry, coffee farmers have resorted to increase the plantations by cultivating it in the forests and taking over the natural habitat of elephants in the region. Since the elephants consider the place their home, they roam about around the plantations often damaging the crop and injuring the workers.
To avoid the situation, the elephants are captured and are trained to make them dependent and non-violent. The wild animals are kept in a wooden cage and tied to chains. The mahauts often resort to starving them for months to tame them and teach them to be dependent on humans. These inhumane treatments are covered in the documentary by Grant.
Some large coffee producers like Starbucks and Tata have fairly efficient ways of coexisting with elephants. They employ people to watch out for elephants and have implemented a notification system to warn workers when elephants are around. When that happens, workers simply move to a safe, elephant-free area on the plantation.
Unfortunately, implementing this method on other coffee plantations in the region is more difficult since Most plantations are only 10 acres or less. Trying to find an area away from the danger of elephants on a plantation that small might be tricky.
Currently the future of the elephants look shady around the coffee plantations. And many solutions have been suggested including tracking of elephants using surveillance and compensation by government for damaged crops. However, all these possible solutions require a lot of time, money, resources and commitment by community as well as government.
Thank you for reading the story until the very end. We appreciate the time you have given us. In addition, your thoughts and inputs will genuinely make a difference to us. Please do drop in a line and help us do better.
Regards,
The CSR Journal Team
