EP1661 Part 1 of 5 | COMSA, Benecke & the Coffee Relationship That Lasted 23 Years | Map It Forward
Advertising Sponsor
This episode is brought to you by Arcadia Green Coffee, Colombian coffee exporters taking fresh green coffee from Colombia to the world, farm to roastery, direct. New office now open in the UK.
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/arcadiagreencoffee/
WhatsApp: https://wa.me/353877871523
Episode Description
This is episode 1 of a five-part series on The Daily Coffee Pro Podcast by Map It Forward with Rodolfo Peñalba, General Manager of COMSA, and Cristian Dubón, a board member and coffee producer from the cooperative in Marcala, Honduras.
Following our previous series with Peruvian coffee cooperatives involved in the Benecke Coffee controversy, this series examines COMSA’s account of its own long-standing commercial relationship with Benecke, its connections with J.J. Darboven, and what happened when that relationship eventually broke down.
Before we can understand the dispute, however, we need to understand what was built.
COMSA was founded in 2001 by a small group of coffee producers looking for a better way to sell their coffee and improve conditions for farming families. Rodolfo explains that the cooperative began with 61 small producers and very little capital, but with the ambition to create stronger access to international markets through organic production, quality coffee and collective action.
In this episode, Rodolfo and Cristian explain why cooperatives play such an important role for small coffee farmers in Honduras, where they say approximately 90% of producers operate farms smaller than 10 hectares and many individual producers have limited direct access to international importers and roasters.
They also discuss COMSA’s emphasis on organic agriculture, environmental responsibility, education and long-term community development, and how the cooperative grew from its beginnings into an organisation with significant infrastructure, technical support programs and almost $4 million in accumulated capital belonging to its members.
Most importantly for this series, we begin tracing COMSA’s relationship with Benecke Coffee.
According to Rodolfo, COMSA first connected with Benecke through Oxy Café in Honduras and began doing business with Benecke around 2002. That relationship would continue for more than two decades.
COMSA also describes how coffee sold through Benecke became connected with J.J. Darboven, including coffee used for the Café Intención brand, and how becoming Fairtrade certified in 2007 helped COMSA increase its access to international markets.
This first episode is the foundation for everything that follows.
The later dispute cannot be understood simply as a customer failing to pay an invoice. COMSA says this was a commercial relationship built over more than twenty years, a relationship around which producers, financing arrangements, infrastructure and expectations of mutual performance developed.
In the next episode, we go deeper into how that relationship expanded and the financial structure required for a cooperative like COMSA to fulfil large international coffee contracts.
You can connect with COMSA here:
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/share/1c5tTT89Rw/?mibextid=wwXIfr
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/comsa_oficial/
Website: https://www.comsa.hn
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/comsa-oficial
Editorial Note:
This episode forms part of Map It Forward’s ongoing examination of the Benecke Coffee controversy. The statements made by Rodolfo Peñalba and Cristian Dubón represent COMSA’s account of events. Some claims discussed in this series remain disputed or have not yet been independently verified. Map It Forward has sought comment from relevant parties and will continue to update its coverage if additional information or evidence becomes available. Where allegations, interpretations or claims are discussed, they should not be understood as findings of legal liability or wrongdoing.