The spirit of Fair Trade can help us to tackle our environmental problems locally

We the coffee farmers of Toumba Yere (which means “push away poverty” in our language, the Sango) in Central African Republic have just now been introduced to the concept of Fair Trade. We believe the spirit of Fair Trade can help us to tackle our environmental problems locally.

Our - we are 2500 farmers and our families - major problem is the bush-fire.

Young men set fire to hunt for deer or only bush rats to have “meat” to eat. The fire spreads. When the wind turns (and that happens naturally most times) the fire reaches our houses. The grass-roofs burn, we take our few belongings and are left with no house. It spreads to our farms and most farmers can tell you of their personal experiences of these fires. A whole coffee farm, a little manioc - burnt to ash. By the end of the dry season, huge areas, frequently 20 km square are burnt.

Huge old trees burn to ashes, after these fires the fields are less productive. All the humus has been burnt away. The only weed that survives it all is the Apollo. We have also felt the impacts of increased CO 2 released into the atmosphere and we know that these fires also contribute to it: in the last 5 years the rains have not exceeded 1700 mm, whilst our coffee needs 1800mm.

We do our best to reduce these fires:
1.At Toumba Yere´s commission of appeal each fire setter/or group of fire setters is fined to re-roof the house and/or partly replant the affected farms.
2.We also have to find alternatives meat sources to meet local demand ? all people locally live on a poor diet and need meat for its protein: We promote techniques to get domestic animals. This programme is offered through our youth wing at Toumba Yere.
3.We promote as part of our technical advice programme the implementayion of fire preventing measures and create fire belts around the villages and farms.

So we are committed to doing the necessary to become environmentally friendlier, despite the fact that our government is not doing much, or is not able to do much for our plight.

We need now your advice, literature, techniques to combat these fires.

Let us enter into a dialogue with you and write to us with any advice and techniques that can help us put a stop to these fires and guard our livelihoods. Even though we are currently unable to trade our coffee with you, as our organisation is not yet able to shoulder the cost involved in exporting our premium quality Robusta coffee to you.