Written by Gustavo Palencia
TEGUCIGALPA (Reuters) – The world's top coffee group will ask the European Union to waive the requirement that its beans come from areas that are not linked to deforestation, the head of the group said on Wednesday.
The law, which will come into force at the end of the year, will ban the sale of coffee – as well as cocoa, soy, palm oil, wood, rubber and cattle – if companies cannot prove that the product comes from an area where the forests are. has not been reduced in recent years.
“We cannot meet that date, it is impossible,” said Vanusia Nogueira, director of the International Coffee Organization (ICO), in an interview.
The ICO, a United Nations affiliate linked to the government, represents more than 90% of coffee production and more than 60% of global consumption. Leading coffee producers such as Brazil, Vietnam and Colombia are member countries.
“It's a very ambitious deadline,” Nogueira said. “We believe that by working together (with EU leaders), they can postpone that day.”
He did not specify how long the ICO wanted to push back the deadline.
Asked about the possible consequences if coffee producers do not meet the deadline, Nogueira said the EU “will find a solution.”
“Europeans are very fond of coffee… they will never be without coffee,” he added.
Nogueira spoke at a coffee conference organized by the Community of Latin American and Caribbean States (CELAC) in Tegucigalpa.
About three CELAC member countries are expected to close the conference with a declaration asking the EU to postpone the date of the deforestation requirement, said Honduran Deputy Minister of Coffee Agriculture Carlos Murillo.
