Our Common Humanity in the Information Age. Principles and Values for Development

SUSTAINABILITY, ONE FARM AT A T IME
Tensie Whelan, Executive Director, Rainforest Alliance
At the Rainforest Alliance we start with the premise that the markets are causing a lot of 
the negative impacts on the environment. If you look at the world, half of the planet’ 
surface is taken up by agriculture, livestock, forestry. Unsustainable agriculture is one 
threat. We know that people aren’t cutting down trees and demonstrating disrespect for 
nature because they are bad, but they are doing it because there are economic pressures 
on them to do so.
Much of the effort regarding the environment traditionally has been project based. You 
could implement exciting projects and get some things done locally, but you may not 
have the market supporting the changes made by a local community. Or you could try to 
clean up a problem after you had massive pollution on the site, but usually that is a little 
too little or a little too late. And we all continue to approach our resources as though they 
were inexhaustible. Nevertheless, we believe the system can be transformed. 
The Rainforest Alliance, as a small NGO that is active internationally, has found we can 
actually transform sectors as we did through developing the idea of sustainable forestry 
certification about 15 years ago. Now about 5% of the world’s fores ts are certified as 
sustainable under the Forest Stewardship Council’s standards. We are seeing companies 
like Ikea and others strongly supporting the incorporation of sustainable forest practices. 
We are seeing large producers change their practices on the ground.
In agriculture, we are seeing that as well: Chiquita - long castigated as a typical banana 
republic type company - over the last ten years has dramatically changed what they are 
doing, so that 100% of their farms are now certified by the Rainforest Alliance. They 
reduced chemical use dramatically and they pay their workers twice the standard. They 
are protecting wildlife and water supplies.

---

62 | Our Common Humanity in the Information Age 
I was just in Colombia a couple of weeks ago. We are working with the Federation of 
Cafeteros of Coffee Growers in Colombia to certify the producers there and companies 
like Kraft who we work with are buying from those producers. The certification process 
has 200 different indicators that are social, environmental and economic. The Millennium 
Declaration Values can be found in the system, which completely transforms how one 
produces bananas, forestry, coffee etc. Small producers are embracing this.
Alvero Bautista who has a small farm in Santander, Colombia says: “first of all, every 
cafetero is an entrepreneur, a protector of biodiversity, a provider of jobs” about the 
process. That is a proud definition for him of what a coffee producer can and should be. 
As he describes what he has done with his community through the process of 
certification: “we had inventoried every tree species in size and age and are working on 
diversification, we have stopped the contamination by coffee pulp of the water, we have 
eliminated fire management which helps us to protect the micro-fiber that is important for 
the fertility of the land, we have created buffer zones around water sources. On our farms, 
people throw their garbage on the ground or into streams. Our farms are clean and we are 
recycling paper, aluminum and glass. Our worker housing used to have dirt floors and 
now we have fixed that and built kitchens and bathrooms. Our permanent workers have 
health benefits and we are making sure that everyone’s kids go to school. On top of that, 
we have put in place financial management. 70% of our farms now have computers and 
we are tracking prices.” This is from a small farmer who has embraced his new role in the 
world.
That is the kind of transformation I see in country after country from farmers who are 
embracing new ways of doing things. Young farmers said “My grandparents and parents 
did this the old way and all of us were leaving and going to the city. This is a way for me 
to see myself differently as a protector of biodiversity, as a protector of jobs and as 
entrepreneur on the global market place.”
Farmers not only help by providing clean water and inventorying bird species, but these 
farmers are seeing in Colombia, for example, an increase by 20% in their productivity. 
That means that they have more coffee to sell, and they have more money. They see 
increases in quality, because of better management systems that are in place and they are 
getting a premium from the product their companies that are supporting them in their 
sustainability investments.
That is the kind of change that we want to see in the world and the fin ancial sector can 
help, so we hope for engagement at a very concrete, substantive level that has the values 
and the very practical changes that create a truly sustainable global supply chain.

---

Chapter III – Respect for Nature and Sustainable Development | 63