➢ The difference between the price paid to coffee farmers and the price paid by consumers (you and me);

➢ The disconnect between the expanding coffee companies (e.g., Starbucks is booming) and the decreasing price paid to coffee farmers;

➢ The social & development priorities of growers (what they would do if they got more money);

➢ The supply chain: number of intermediaries between the growers and the consumers;

➢ The limited number of multinationals that control the world coffee market;

➢ The negotiation process at the World Trade Organization (WTO);

➢ The agricultural subsidies the United States and the European Union (EU) give their farmers and the impossibility for third world government to support their own farmers (structural adjustment programmes and WTO rules forbid subsidies, among other things). Please note: these references to subsidies to US and European farmers are not about coffee; they are about other agricultural products (there is no coffee production in the US and in Europe).

➢ The importance of agriculture in the economies of developing countries.