Ronel Rondubio
De La Salle University Manila
Pia Manalastas
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Coffee for Peace (CFP) began as a peacebuilding organization and has been in operation for 14 years now. They use social entrepreneurship as a business strategy to achieve justice and harmony in society and the environment. According to the CEO and Co-Founder of CFP, Felicitas “Joji” B. Pantoja, “Coffee is the vehicle, but the product is peace.”
By organizing and paying farmers fair prices for their coffee, connecting them to the market, and inspiring them to become social entrepreneurs, Coffee for Peace uses coffee to encourage relational harmony. Farmers are taught the processes needed to produce high-quality coffee.
Coffee for Peace, being an expert roastery and a dependable processor of high-quality beans, promotes business continuity for business owners while supporting local farming communities. They allow buyers to develop their brands under a Memorandum of Agreement (MOA), where farmers receive 10% of every kilogram sold.
By purchasing CFP products online, customers from Luzon and the Visayas are indirectly contributing to the peace-building process in Mindanao. The CFP's Peace and Reconciliation Teams, comprised of volunteers from conflict-affected areas and foreign volunteers, are given 25% of the organization's net profit. They have received training in inter-faith dialogue, cross-cultural communication, trauma healing, relief work, and medical operations.
To help farmers understand what consumers want in coffee and the value of what they do, CFP educates them on the market and raises their awareness of the need for more fair trade pricing. After the training, CFP provides post-harvest services, like coffee pulping, dehulling, and drying, at a cost to partner communities. Additionally, Coffee for Peace provides shared services like toll roasting, packaging, label design, and photography to its partner farmers and customers. As a result of the training, these communities in the Philippines are now producing higher-quality coffee.
Ms. Joji Pantoja said, “We trained them not only with coffee farming but how to become coffee bean processors. We are looking to make them not just productive coffee farmers but also to turn them into entrepreneurs."
The Obo Manobo Coffee Farmers pose for a photo at the Philippine Coffee Expo 2022 wherein PBCI and CFP serve as consultants on community development and social entrepreneurial skills.
It all began when two Filipino-Canadian missionaries, Rev. Luis Daniel “Dann” Pantoja and Felicitas “Joji” Pantoja, were sent to Mindanao to conduct peacebuilding work by the Mennonite Church in Canada in 2004. The missionaries established PeaceBuilders Community, Inc. (PBCI) in 2006, a distinct Filipino identity that has aided in improving ties with local communities. PBCI was entirely funded by the Mennonite Church up until 2008, when the CFP social enterprise was started. A three-year program offered by CFP encourages collaboration between native and settler communities along the coffee value chain while educating farmers on how to grow premium coffee. CFP sells its coffee beans both domestically and abroad.
The value chain for coffee accounts for about half of the CFP's funding, with individual Canadian members investing the remaining amount. Contrary to its previous partnership with the Mennonite Central Committee (MCC), the Mennonite Church's non-profit organization, PBCI now encourages individual church members to make investments in the social enterprise rather than receiving grants from the organization. CFP has grown as a result of these investments.
The concept was born when the founders, along with their Mindanao-based peacebuilding network, assisted in facilitating an informal conflict mediation between some migrant and Bangsamoro farming communities. The two groups engaged in a violent conflict over ownership of several rice fields. The leaders of the two parties in conflict were invited for a conversation over coffee rather than exchanging gunfire. The two communities have since stopped killing each other. They started extending invitations to neighboring communities to meet for coffee — for peace.
Ms. Joji Pantoja expressed that Coffee for Peace “uses coffee production as a tool to address the economic, environmental and peace issues prevalent in conflict-affected communities.”
Coffee for Peace has made contributions to 11 of the 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) of the United Nations.
• No Poverty. CFP focuses on economically marginalized communities due to geography and historical injustices against them. They pay their farming partners PhP350.00 ($8.75) per day.
• Quality Education. In their tribal farming partners in Kalinga Province, CFP offers vocational and livelihood training among youth in coordination and cooperation with the local high school principal and teachers.
• Gender Equality. Women make up 80% of CFP's farming partners.
• Clean Water and Sanitation. Larger trees are required as shade for Arabica coffee trees. The larger trees preserved and planted as part of CFP's Arabica farming program safeguard the forested mountains where their farming partners operate, thereby protecting the watershed near their general areas of operation.
• Decent Work and Economic Growth. CFP encourages its farming partners to participate in trading and livelihood programs that are justice oriented. They are teaching them how to process, package, and market their products in addition to being raw material suppliers. They are preparing them to be "farmerpreneurs" by training them to process their products through the various value chain stages.
• Industry, Innovation, and Infrastructure. CFP aims to comprehend and gain knowledge of their farming communities' traditions, social structures, and indigenous economic systems. For CFP, contemporary technology must be assessed, processed, applied, and evaluated through the prisms of local, indigenous knowledge.
• Reduced Inequalities. CFP collaborates with foreign distributors and buyers, such as Level Ground Trading, and has invited them to the Philippines to visit their farming communities. As a foundation for a long-term partnership, their local and international buyers-clients are also educated on inclusive development.
• Climate Action. Farmers, the environment, and peacebuilding comprise CFP's three main advocacies. They organize and train their farming partners in Peace and Reconciliation (PAR) Communities, and a component of the training includes learning various skills for preparing for and responding to disasters.
• Life on Land. Their program for growing Arabica, which includes protecting the forests and planting large trees, lessens soil erosion in the mountains.
• Peace, Justice, and Strong Institutions. CFP's farming partners are organized into Peace and Reconciliation Communities. The training program covers the fundamentals of conflict resolution, negotiation, mediation, and other active non-violent justice advocacy.
• Partnerships for the Goals. CFP is a member of a global network of faith-based peacebuilders and inclusive development practitioners in the business and financial sectors who are all dedicated to the welfare of their farming partners.
Demystifying the coffee industry for local farmers is an important part of CFP's strategy. CFP began by teaching farmers how to produce premium coffee and encouraging them to demand fair prices when selling it to foreign businesses. Because of CFP's involvement, the communities' livelihoods have improved tremendously. According to Bennette Grace Tenecio-Mañulit, the Vice President for Public Relations of Coffee for Peace, these farmers used to sell coffee beans for 30 to 50 pesos per kilo. With CFP’s help, they are now selling coffee beans for 300 to 700 pesos per kilo. These farming communities “are very knowledgeable now on coffee trading and marketing with the help of our government agencies and partners.” And as CFPs Senior Vice President Tala Bautista put it: “… we teach them the price so they are not just suppliers, but they are also entrepreneurs”.
Due to the pandemic, CFP cafés in Davao were forced to close early in 2020 to protect the staff and adhere to government protocols. To help the enterprise and "farmerpreneurs" rise up, they keep sharing the CFP story and the high quality of Region XI and Philippine coffee with the media on their website and social media, at academic and industry conferences, and in pop-up kiosks in malls. They continue to train farmers in coffee production and baristas in the art of brewing. They also encourage Filipinos to buy local to support the country's recovery.
CFP gradually recovered 50% and then 80% of the revenue lost due to COVID-19. The increase in sales exceeded pre-pandemic levels, and their task now is to keep revenue margins up for the benefit of farming communities.
To address the economic, environmental, and peace-related problems prevalent in conflict-affected communities, Coffee for Peace uses coffee production as a tool. The business trains farmers in rural and indigenous communities, and eventually, these farmers and communities supply Coffee for Peace with coffee cherries and coffee beans. Communities that have long been embroiled in conflict are given stable employment opportunities through this initiative.
One of the three-pronged advocacies of Coffee for Peace is environmental protection. Bennette Grace Tenecio-Mañulit said that when CFP "started to journey with the IP communities, the trees were cut down." But when they learned that Arabica coffee trees need larger trees for shade, they did not cut trees anymore. Instead, "they are now planting trees, protecting the trees that are existing on the other side of Mt. Apo, and they are also asking those climbers, hikers, and migrants" because this is their ancestral domain, they must protect it for their future and the generations to come.
These communities also used to kill civet cats for food. However, when CFP educated them on the value of civet cats and the high quality of civet coffee that they produce, they ceased killing them and learned to take care of the civet cats.
Bennette Grace Tenecio-Mañulit also shared what one Datu (head of a clan or tribe) told them "hanap-buhay is buhay" (livelihood is life). That is why it is imperative that "we take care of our environment, or the ancestral domain (where we get our resources)," to keep their livelihood for posterity.
Ms. Tenecio-Mañulit added that "they also learned how to relate harmoniously with others, not only to their communities but also to the migrants and other people groups who are visiting their communities, and they also know how to relate to the government."
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Bennette Grace Tenecio-Mañulit, Vice President for Public Relations
Coffee for Peace, Inc. (CFP) is a social enterprise that works with indigenous people and the underprivileged in rural areas of the Philippines to promote economic empowerment, peace and reconciliation, and environmental protection.