Coffee: Fight for Life
Pueblo Nuevo is a community in the highlands of Simojovel, Chiapas. While the community is quite isolated, it has been heavily influenced by forces of globalization, particularly with the introduction of coffee production as the main source of livelihood and the more recent influence of the North Atlantic Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA). Since colonization, what was once a self-sufficient community, is now almost exclusively dependent on the production and sale of coffee for its survival.
Before NAFTA, the government tried to sustain the production of coffee by offering incentives to communities like Pueblo Nuevo, establishing minimum payment prices for producers and granting them access to credit. With the application of NAFTA, Mexico agreed to losen certain trade barriers and open itself up to foreign markets. This favored the export of products like coffee, however increased competition between small coffee producers and large corporations such as Nestlé, negatively affecting the economic potential of coffee producers to obtain a dignified and fair living wage. To make matters worse, the “Roya”, a mushroom that kills coffee plants, has overwhelmed the region, with coffee producers struggling to maintain enough of their harvest. All of these factors have combined to create a challenging environment for the villagers of Pueblo Nuevo to obtain adequate nutrition.
Through the project "Coffee: Fight for Life”, Eliazar Pérez Cruz y Solene Charrasse look to provide a voice for the community, while also raising awareness of the connection between their dependence on coffee production and their poor nutrition.
