So, if you are trying to cut down on caffeine in 2013 then there’s no need to compromise on quality (our Decaf Roast & Ground coffee won the award in 2011). Equally, if your New Year’s resolution is to experiment more with coffee, then our wholebeans are the perfect place to start. Watch our video to show you how to get the best out of your coffee.

The awards are given to exceptional food and drink each year, and we have won over 20 awards for our tea, coffee and hot chocolate over the last five years.

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Over 1000 companies applied for these awards so it is a real honour to be celebrated for exceeding best sustainable practices in our work in Africa.

In our application we explained how our unusual business model has improved both environmental and social practices with our producer partners in Africa.

One example we used was from Uganda, where working conditions for coffee sorters were dramatically improved. Before the new warehouse the women would have to sit on the concrete floor all day, sorting defective beans from the good ones. They were paid by the bag, and worked outside. Now the women work indoors, picking the beans from a conveyor belts under daylight quality artificial lights, protected from the often harsh weather conditions in a well ventilated building. They are now paid by the weight of the defects they pick, so are rewarded according to effort. The speed of hand-sorting has increased, and has led to an increase in pay for the women.

Kayonza Growers Tea Factory in Western Uganda, was used as one of the environmental examples. Their award winning entry  to our ‘Tackling Climate Change Together’ competition was a proposal to increase tea and other food production, start a tree planting project along with a project to reduce household energy costs and improve environmental impact through the installation of energy saving cooking stoves and rain water harvesting tanks.

It is always nice to win a shiny trophy; it keeps the fire in our bellies going that drives us to look for more innovative ways to continue improving.

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We recently told you about a competition we are running amongst our producer partners to find the most innovative and sustainable ways to tackle climate change. We know that this is one of the most pressing matters affecting smallholder growers today and is frequently the topic of our conversations with producers.

Overall, 12 producers entered proposals in to the competition, for the chance to win the prize fund of £10,000. Proposals were entered from both African and Latin American producers, spanning a variety of different cooperatives, including cocoa, tea and coffee – a very good mix!

The expert panel assessed all entries and came up with a short-list of best, and now we proudly can announce that there were, in fact, two winners, each of whom will win the prize of £10,000!

Traditionally parchment coffee is dried in the sun at CESMACH, but winning the prize will pay for solar-powered air dryers.

CESMACH (Campesinos Ecológicos de la Sierra Madre de Chiapas), Mexico
This cooperative won joint place with their proposal to install 20 dome-type solar dryers for the drying of  ‘parchment coffee’. Traditionally, drying takes place outside in the sunlight (like in the picture below), but increasing rainfall due to climate change means that this process is no longer straight forward, as the weather is not always suitable. These new solar-powered dryers will enable growers to increase efficiency and mitigate the effects of climate change, as well as allowing them to have more control over the quality of the beans they produce. This money will initially go towards providing 20 communities with dryers, with more to follow in the medium-long term.

Kayonza Tea Factory won one of the two the prizes for thier ongoing commitment to tackling the effects of climate change

Kayonza Growers Tea Factory, Uganda
This tea partner has been working on innovative ways of reducing the impact of climate change for a while, and now they have won this prize for their overall climate change adaptation strategy. Their proposal outlined methods of supporting farmers to increase food security, enabling them to diversify their income and secure conservation of natural resources. The prize money will enable double the amount of farmers to benefit from the existing good work happening at this tea factory in Africa.

We will keep you updated about progress of these projects over next year. Congratulations to both organisations – well done!

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Lord Taylor, the Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for DEFRA, handed out certificates to the UK finalists at a ceremony last week. He commented that:

‘The 12 companies chosen for Europe are the cream of the crop in terms of UK environmental innovation and demonstration of their “green” commitments.’

The European Awards for the Environment are only held once every two years and aim to recognise companies that successfully bring together innovation, economic viability and environmental concerns. They consist of five awards and we are in the running for both International Business Cooperation and Biodiversity.

The eventual winners of each EBAE category will be announced in Brussels during Green Week in May. The UK has an excellent track record in the EBAE awards with an award winner in every EBAE since 1994. Let’s hope it is Cafédirect this year!!

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Our newest recruit to the Cafédirect range is the ‘add water’ São Tomé hot chocolate.  Distinctive, premium quality, and 100% sourced from the island of São Tomé on the West coast of Africa. Living up to its unparalleled reputation for growing some of the most prized cocoa beans on earth, known as ‘Criollo’, the cocoa from this island produces a velvety chocolate taste and a bold, intense aroma.  Made with just four (100% natural) ingredients, this is one of the “cleanest” add water hot chocolates in the market. Take a look at ‘Ravinder’s Best Ever Hot Chocolate’ recipe (below) if you’re feeling indulgent – it’s a real treat and great for winter nights!

Our longer-standing San Cristobal ‘add milk’ hot chocolate (a winner at the Great Taste Awards in both 2009 and 2011) is luxurious and rich, made from the purest, most natural ingredients sourced from the Dominican Republic. Single origin cocoa accounts for 40% of the ingredients, making it one of the highest cocoa contents on the market today.  There are no hydrogenated vegetable oils or added nasties so the fine cocoa is expertly blended with cane sugar to create a drinking chocolate that’s exceptionally creamy and, thanks to its high cocoa content, more-ishly chocolatey.

In case of sugar low emergency, we also highly recommend this Tiffin Cake recipe to get you back on track!

The post São Tomé and San Cristobal hot chocolates launch in Waitrose! appeared first on Cafedirect.

The awards, given by the Guild of Fine Food, are like the Oscars for food and are awarded after a rigorous judging process. It’s a wonderful endorsement of the skill of our smallholder grower partners and a fabulous reward for their personal care and attention of every bean, leaf and pod. Whilst we’re well known for our gold standard ethics, we’re perhaps less well known for our outstanding taste, so we’re very proud of these awards. Proof that great taste and great ethics can go hand in hand!

So is your favourite amongst the winners? Gold stars were awarded for our Hand-Picked Tea, San Cristobal Drinking Chocolate, Decaffeinated Medium Roast & Ground Coffee, Machu Picchu Freeze Dried Coffee and Espresso beans.

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Our application focused on our Producer Partnership Programme, the investment we make back into the producer groups we trade with, which has existed since 1996 and is a cornerstone of what makes our business different.  The Guardian writers have done a lovely job of summarising the PPP & how it fits into our overall business model, so check out their words HERE.

According to the judges, our entry stood out for “the way in which [Cafédirect] reinvest in the communities in which they operate”.  They were also impressed by the way the project was truly integrated into the business as whole.

We also applied and were long listed in the Supply Chain category. Our entry here focussed on the story behind our new São Tomé drinking chocolate.  Once again, you can read their well crafted words HERE.

Here’s me picking up the award on behalf of Cafédirect … very exciting!

Me receiving the award alongside Host Angela Lamont and Warren Lewis of LG, the Social Impact category sponsor. Photo: Sam Friedrich, www.acumenimages.com

One of the most interesting parts of the awards night was seeing the variety of shortlisted organisations, ranging from the very small (a la Chest of Drawers) to the very large (a la Unilever) going head to head for recognition.

As one of those smaller companies who prides itself on punching above our weight in some very big commodities markets, this award means a whole lot.

Congratulations to all the other finalists and winners, and to the Guardian for putting together an excellent awards scheme that looks beyond one-off projects and CSR programmes to those companies really integrating sustainbility into a new type of business.

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AdapCC? I’m a broken record when it comes to talking about this pioneering collaboration with four of our producer partners and GTZ to support small farmers to adapt to climate change.   Find out more here.

The MDGs? These are the Millenium Development Goals, a set of ambitious goals set in 2000 by the UN to make some headway in key development issues.   Endorsed by 189 countries and with a target of 2015, these eight goals promote poverty reduction, education, maternal health, gender equality, environmental sustainability and aim at combating child mortality, AIDS and other diseases.  With only five years to go, the UN is currently meeting in New York to discuss how to boost progress.

What’s the relation? Having been awarded on the London and UK stages already, the latest recognition for AdapCC is international … as in, from the United Nations!

We’re proud to say that AdapCC has been designated one of ten highly commended entries  in the biennial World Business and Development Awards!

This means that AdapCC “demonstrated a strong linkage between vital business practices and innovative efforts to achieve the Millennium Development Goals”.

Jointly organised by the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), the International Chamber of Commerce (ICC) and the International Business Leaders Forum (IBLF), the awards acknowledge the contribution of the private sector to help achieve the MDGs through their core business.

We’ve always believed that business has a role to play in addressing global issues that go far beyond profit.  This recognition is further proof that our business model of starting with a 100% Fairtrade product range, reinvesting profit into our partner organisations (into projects like AdapCC!) and sharing the risk and decision-making with producer groups is a viable way forward.

Congratulations to our partners in this endeavour:  CEPICAFE in Peru, Más Café in Mexico, PRODECOOP in Nicaragua, German Technical Cooperation (GTZ), acting on behalf of the German Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ).

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Compiled from researching public records, campaign and government information, The Good Shopping Guide reports on and ranks the ethical scores of companies in 15 categories relating to the environment, human rights, animal welfare and other social responsibilities.

Cafédirect was awarded the top rating in each of the 15 categories and are the only company to reach this high level of recognition in this group. Overall, Cafédirect was one of only six companies with this level of  accreditation across all categories throughout the entire shopping guide – impressive eh!

As the Good Shopping Guide states, ” It is really important to look at the whole company behind some of the Fairtrade brands as not all have exemplary ethical records, especially the supermarkets behind some of own-label Fairtrade. This is why we recommend you choose Cafédirect, our topscoring brand and the only company to have gained ethical accreditation from the Ethical Company Organisation (which guarantees a clean record not only on Fairtrade, but also on a whole raft of human, animal welfare and environmental criteria).”

You can read about this in more detail here or if you’d like make your purchasing decisions on more than just price buy a copy of the book online here. Spread the word and let as many people as possible know that not only do we have great tasting & award winning Fairtrade drinks – we’re the No. 1 Ethical tea & coffee brand too!

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Each product entered undergoes a rigorous judging process with each entry tasted and reviewed by at least three different judging panels made up of restaurant critics, chefs, food writers and other industry experts.

“We are thrilled that the growers’ hard work and dedication has led to these exciting wins.These awards demonstrate how our direct grower partnerships deliver the best quality products. We’re honoured this has been recognised once again by these important awards.” Anne MacCaig, CEO Cafédirect.

We’ve shared the exciting news with the growers behind these great tasting products including Andrew Ethuru,  Chair of the Fairtrade Premium Committee at Michimikuru Tea Factory in Kenya, whose tea goes into Everyday Tea.  Here’s what he says: “I’m really delighted by the news of these awards. At Michimikuru, our partnership with Cafédirect started in 2005, during which time they supported us for two years in qualifying for Fairtrade certification. Cafédirect is very different from other Fairtrade certified buyers as, alongside the normal premiums paid, they use their profits to support us through their yearly reinvestment programme.”

Our award winners are our bright & refreshing Everyday Tea and Decaffeinated Everyday Tea blends, our invigorating English Breakfast tea, the lovely & mellow Machu Picchu Fresh Ground coffee and our intense Rich Roast coffee. All of these are available to buy from our online shop here as well as from major supermarkets, Oxfam shops and independent retailers so treat yourself to an award winning drink today!

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