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Starbucks finally lost out to Ethiopia in the battle they were fighting to keep Ethiopian coffee cheap. (Starbucks press release)

The price of coffee on the world market was US$2.29 a kilogramme in fiscal 2006, as stated in their CSR report. Now you know the money premium coffee chains make off of you.

Starbucks made US$564 million in net earnings last year. But look at the bigger picture. Starbucks is just one of the many premium coffee chains making billions.

I'm sure you have seen Starbucks' coffee board. Coffees from Brazil, Colombia, Costa Rica, Guatemala, Ethiopia, Kenya, Tanzania, and Indonesia. According to the IMF, 65th, 96th, 75th, 102nd, 181st, 142nd, 168th, and 116th respectively in a list of 181 countries ranked by nominal per capita GDP. 5 out of the 8 main countries that Starbucks sources coffee from is outside the top 100 in the list. Has Starbucks contributed to improving living standards in these countries? There isn't any evidence to show.

Yet, Starbucks has fought the Ethiopian government for the past 3 years to try to stop Ethiopia from trademarking their specialty coffees, which would enable Ethiopian coffee to move up the value chain, thus allowing for higher raw coffee bean prices.

Ethiopia is the poorest country Starbucks sources its coffee from, and it has used much-needed resources to win this important argument. It is a pity that the other source countries just cannot spare their scarce resources to forge similar agreements.

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