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Coffee Watch Publications

Coffee Companies are readier for the EUDR than they claim

Coffee Watch Founder & Director wrote an Op-Ed published by Mongabay. Major coffee companies and industry groups attempted to weaken the EU Deforestation Regulation (EUDR), delaying its implementation until 2025 despite its goal of curbing deforestation and human rights abuses. The EU’s coffee imports contribute significantly to deforestation, child labor, and slavery, with millions of workers trapped in extreme poverty and forests being cleared for plantations, especially in Brazil, Vietnam, and Indonesia. Despite industry complaints, compliance costs are minimal, and coffee supply chains are simpler than other regulated commodities; companies must take responsibility without shifting the burden onto vulnerable farmers and workers.

Joint Letter to Ursula von der Leyen

We have joined more than 265 organisations to call the EU commission to uphold regulations that protect health, nature, climate, social justice, including workers' and trade union rights.

“Ghost Farms and Coffee Laundering”

This report details labor conditions on coffee farms in Yunnan Province based on three undercover field investigations, which found substantial abuses in Starbucks’ and Nestlé’s supply chains, especially affecting Indigenous communities.

Exploitation and Opacity

A new report by Empower in collaboration with Coffee Watch and the Economic, Social and Cultural Rights Project, A.C. (ProDESC) titled “Exploitation and Opacity: The Hidden Reality of the Mexican Coffee in Nestlé and Starbucks Supply Chains,” finds that Mexican certified coffee marketed by Nestlé and Starbucks, is plagued by human rights violations, negative environmental impacts, and exploitative practices that trap small producers in Mexico in a cycle of extreme poverty.

Open Letter: Ensuring EUDR benchmarking reflects human rights and environmental risks

Coffee Watch has signed an open letter alongside 39 other organisations calling on the EU Commission to ensure the EUDR country benchmarking reflects human rights and environmental risks. Under the EUDR, the EU Commission will develop a methodology to benchmark countries based on the risk that their commodities are linked to deforestation. We are calling on the EU not to compromise the benchmarking through political deals and to consider human rights and legality.
Tropical forest burns in Mato Grosso, Brazil. Photo courtesy of Marizilda Cruppe / Greenpeace.

With Europe’s move to delay tropical forest protections, everything burns

Forests. We can’t live without them. If they burn, we die.

Get Deforestation Out of Europe's Coffee

This briefing provides separate lines of evidence for why it is vital that coffee be regulated by the EUDR, and why coffee companies seeking to undermine the EUDR or find excuses for non-compliance, should not be considered as neutral interlocutors articulating reasonable and data-driven arguments.

Coffee Prices Skyrocket From Decades of Deforestation

To save future coffee, adopting agroforestry is key.

Coffee’s Regulatory Blend

Mandatory sustainability regulations are rapidly becoming the new standard for global commodities, including coffee. This shift is not just necessary but overdue, establishing a level playing field that prioritizes human rights and environmental preservation.
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Partner Publications

High hopes, low prices: How Nestlé is driving Mexican coffee farmers to ruin

Nestlé wants to be a leader in terms of ethical behaviour. However, Nestlé pursues a ruthless purchasing policy, particularly for its instant coffee. The farmers pay the price, as research in Southern Mexico shows.

Child Labor in the Coffee Sector in Eastern Uganda

Engaged in such activities as picking and sorting berries or transporting beans and supplies, children working in Uganda’s coffee supply chain experience risks to their safety and mental and physical wellbeing.

Bitter brew: Modern slavery in the coffee industry in Brazil

Despite repeated pledges to address the issue, major coffee brands are still failing to eradicate modern slavery from their supply chains. This report documents forced labour, debt bondage, and other abhorrent forms of exploitation in Brazilian coffee.

Caffeine Jungle - Child labor, struggling farmers found on 'ethically' certified coffee farms in southern Mexico

Child labor, struggling farmers found on 'ethically' certified coffee farms in southern Mexico. "Impact" discovered a group of children working on a Rainforest Alliance-certified farm in Chiapas, Mexico in 2021, with some as young as 6 years old.

Starbucks: slave and child labour found at certified coffee farms in Minas Gerais

An exclusive investigation reveals cases of slave and child labor in Brazilian coffee farms holding the C.A.F.E. Practices certification, owned by Starbucks in partnership with SCS Global Services (also holding the UTZ seal).

Multinational coffee companies ignore accusations and continue buying from suppliers linked to farms with slave labour in Brazil

Incidents of labour under conditions analogous to slavery on Brazilian coffee farms during the 2021 harvest were not enough to provoke a reaction from major importers of the bean in the US and Europe. They still buy coffee “contaminated” by abuses.
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