Christina, who does some work for Ideal Bite and who’s got some contacts within Starbucks, got replies — although not actual answers — to the 3 questions I asked about Starbucks’ policies regarding fair trade here.

Longtime readers of green LA girl have come across a lot of this Starbucks talk before, but we’ve got a lot of newbies plugging away at the Starbucks Challenge. Thus, I’ll feature one Q&A per post. Here’s part 1:

SIEL: Starbucks continuously says that it has similar goals as the fair trade movement. But if so, why hasn’t Starbucks met even the MINIMUM commitment to fair trade certified coffee (5% in 2 years) set out by TFUSA? Are there any plans to walk the talk — i.e. get above 5% to REALLY become a leader in the fair trade movement — in the near future?

STARBUCKS: Starbucks is a leader in this area. Starbucks purchased 11.5 million pounds (4.5 million kg.) of Fair Trade Certified™ coffee in FY 2005. This is approximately 10% of global imports and 21% of all Fair Trade Certified™ coffee imported into the U.S. Beyond the significant volume of Fair Trade Certified™ coffee that Starbucks purchases, Starbucks further supports our common goals with the Fair Trade movement by paying premium prices for coffee purchases and through programs that provide access to affordable credit, purchase directly from farmers, invest in social projects in coffee communities, purchases of conservation (shade grown) coffees and encourage participation in C.A.F.E. Practices (Coffee and Farmer Equity Practices) — a set of responsible coffee buying guidelines that offers preferential buying status for participants that score the highest in social and environmental criteria on verified reports. In FY 2005 Starbucks purchased 76.8 million pounds of coffee from C.A.F.E. Practices approved suppliers representing 24.6% of Starbucks total coffee purchases. Starbucks goal in 2007 is to purchase 225 million pounds of C.A.F.E. Practices verified coffees, which will represent the majority of all coffee that we purchase. Starbucks is committed to purchasing coffee in a socially responsible manner. Our numbers (and percentages) demonstrate this.

I guess I’m gonna have to take this as a very long-winded way of saying that Starbucks has no immediate plans to walk the talk in terms of its alleged commitment to fair trade.

What I’m asking is why Starbucks hasn’t even met the 5% minimum recommendation set out by TransFair USA, the nonprofit that certifies fair trade products for the US, despite the mermaid’s claim that it’s a leader in terms of fair trade.

Starbucks is super huge, so obviously, in terms of millions of lbs, the mermaid’s gonna outweigh the purchases of other companies. Since now, 1 of 3 coffee shops in the US is a Starbucks, it’s no question that even a minimal purchase by Starbucks will mean millions of lbs of coffee. But with great size comes great responsibility, yes?

As for CAFE practices — We all know, the CAFE practices standards are much lower than the fair trade standards (my posts about it here and here). The fact that Starbucks is trying to sell its customers on its self-made, watered-down standards in lieu of fair trade is not gonna make us believe that “Starbucks is a leader in this area.”

Starbucks has a huge marketing arm, money, and tons of resources. If it really wants to be a leader, it can easily become one — Start by climbing to the bare minimum of 5% fair trade coffee.

Update: Part 2 and 3 are up!

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