Come 8:30 a.m. in any U.S. city, a line forms in Starbucks—brimming with eager patrons ready to start their day with foamy designer lattes or steaming shots of espresso. They sip their Grande fat-free Mocachinos without a moment’s contemplation of the repercussions. As they stroll to their respective destinations—white paper cups in hand—pure injustice is occurring to coffee plantation workers in Ethiopia.
Like most Americans, I am far from being innocent—I have waited in seemingly endless lines at Starbucks and similar coffee shops, in need of that eye-opening cup of coffee first thing in the morning. When I viewed the screening of the documentary, Black Gold, by filmmakers Marc and Nick Francis, I was upset and appalled on learning about the plight and exploitation of coffee farmers in Ethiopia. They are quickly becoming bankrupt and experiencing famine, while multinational coffee corporations are showing profits in the billions of dollars. I was stunned and felt overwhelmingly guilty that I had never really contemplated in depth the consequences of drinking my morning latte, and like many naïve Americans, had chosen to conveniently ignore the issues invisible in front of me. Black Gold exposes the weightiness of our every day decisions and the reality of how it truly affects the livelihood of thousands of Ethiopian coffee farmers.
Black Gold follows Tadesse Meskela, an Ethiopian man who is the manager of the Oromia Coffee Union—a union of Ethiopian coffee farming co-ops. On a mission to obtain fair wages for his workers, the difficulties and troubles he faces on a daily basis are a tragic and inspiring dichotomy. The viewer is transported into Tadesse’s world as he tries to save thousands of co-op members from bankruptcy, famine, poverty, and starvation. He travels to London and Seattle—two cities that have a large impact on the coffee industry—on a quest to find buyers that will support his union’s coffee at fair trade prices. This would provide farmers a fair wage for their immense amount of labor. The documentary stretches through numerous cities around the globe—London, New York, Seattle, Trieste, and lastly, Cancun for a conference of the World Trade Organization (WTO). These various cities exemplify the impact of the coffee trading industry on the world.
