Coffee women conquer the market
Projektdauer: 3 years (2020–2022)
Land: Colombia
Partnerorganisation: Red Nacional de Mujeres, Bogotá, Colombia
With this project, Red Nacional de Mujeres (RNM) supports two cooperatives of female coffee growers in the Colombian departments of Quindio and Tolima. Although both de-partments were heavily affected by the armed conflicts in more recent years, the efforts to implement the peace treaty takes very little account of them. This gap is being closed by the project.
Ways to optimize work processes and to improve access to the market are investigated jointly. RNM asked an external expert working for “Travesía Café” to help implement im-provements to the coffee production. This organization dedicates its work to promoting sustainable coffee production and fair trade. The expert gives her advice to the women on production processes, quality control and marketing. In addition to specific knowledge transfer, the agenda also provides further education trainings on gender equality. Analysing the balance of power that prevails in the respective region and naming the major actors both on the economic and the political level helps the women to develop a strategy, jointly with RNM. This will enable them to exert more influence in their region.
Implementation was very slow due to the pandemic and the ensuing travel restrictions. The project will therefore not be completed before spring 2023.
The project is partnered by the national women’s network “Red Nacional de Mujeres” in Bogotà, an alliance of several independent women’s organizations with an experience of many years in project development and gender knowledge transfer in Colombia