A contribution from Martin Elwert from 31 March 2022
We couldn’t be happier about a special honor we have received: The Specialty Coffee Association (SCA) has honored our biodiversity project in Ethiopia with its coveted Sustainability Award. We take this as an enthusiastic endorsement of our concept of working hand-in-hand with local communities.
The Specialty Coffee Association is the most important organization in the specialty coffee sector and is a non-profit organization that promotes knowledge exchange, sustainability and fair pay models for farmers. The SCA Sustainability Award is presented in three categories: Project, Business Model, and Individual. The people and companies honored in these areas have addressed the challenges facing the specialty coffee sector.
Since our founding in 2010, we have been working closely with local communities in the Jimma Zone in Ethiopia to conserve and enrich biodiversity. This includes ensuring access to clean drinking water, maintaining and establishing sanitation facilities, conducting hygiene trainings, and strengthening nutrition-sensitive agriculture. These four individual projects are part of the overarching Biodiversity Plan, for which the SCA awarded us for the first time.
These sub-areas are closely interlinked and interdependent, because without hygiene training and the construction of sanitary facilities, the creation of access to clean drinking water is also null and void.
„This award means a lot to us,“ says Coffee Circle Managing Director Martin Elwert, „and we are enormously proud that SCA has chosen our project. For Coffee Circle and our partners, the SCA Award is not just about the project itself: We see it as an award for ten years of work we’ve done in the countries of origin.“
Without our partners on the ground in Ethiopia and our partners like Welthungerhilfe, COQUA, local NGOs like HUNDEE and the German Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development, the biodiversity project would not have been feasible.
„We are happy and feel proud about the recognition of our joint project (CC, WHH and Hundee- the local partner),“ says Tiringo Kinfegabriel, the Head of Programmes of Welthungerhilfe in Ethiopia. „The strong and honest commitment of Coffee Circle and the hard work of the team, we believe, deserves the award! This project successfully improved the living conditions of coffee farming communities through promoting sustainable production system while protecting the environment. The award reconfirms that we are doing the right thing. And it provides big motivation and more energy to strengthen our joint effort to continue supporting the community.“
And without you as supporters, no money would have been raised. The award belongs to all of us. It will be awarded at the Re:co Symposium on April 6 and 7, 2022 in Boston, USA.
More information about our project approach and our work can be found here.
Martin Elwert
Martin ist seit 2010 Gründer und Geschäftsführer von Coffee Circle. Martin treibt die Vision des Unternehmens voran und ist für die Umsetzung unserer Projekte in den Anbauländern verantwortlich.