Black Gold is a documentary released in 2006 that deals with a non-evident but the extremely crucial problem the world faces today. The film is about coffee production with a special focus on the position of farmers in Ethiopia, which is the birthplace of coffee that produces the most high-quality beans. Throughout the whole movie, the audience sees Tadesse Meskela, who is the representative of the Oromia Coffee Farmers Cooperative Union, which unites seventy-four cooperatives in Southern Ethiopia (M. J. Francis & N. Francis, 2006). Mr. Meskela’s stories about Ethiopian farmers help the audience realize that despite great amounts of coffee export, people there live below the poverty line because of the low wages.
The film reveals several interesting facts about coffee. Thus, coffee is the second commodity that is most actively traded since its sales increased more than fifty billion dollars since 1990 (M. J. Francis & N. Francis, 2006). At the same time, workers in Ethiopia get almost no money for harvesting coffee beans. That is why Mr. Meskela tries to look for buyers worldwide to establish a fair price for the coffee beans and help Ethiopian farmers get higher wages. He states that many middlemen establish unreasonably high coffee prices, and that is why it is important to sell it straightly to buyers. Mr. Meskela considers that it is the consumers who will help in establishing fair wages for the farmers who harvest coffee beans (M. J. Francis & N. Francis, 2006). People should understand that the farmers who are the main coffee suppliers get almost no money for their job, and the major revenue comes from the companies that buy the coffee beans. This problem may be solved only after it is commonly acknowledged, and more people are aware of its existence.
Black Gold openly displays the coffee-making process demonstrating every step of it. The authors probably tried to show how tiring this job is for Ethiopian workers and that the great efforts they make are not fairly paid since they get less than fifty cents per day. As a result, the workers are not able to provide themselves and their children with better living conditions such as good food, houses, or education. It is called a vicious circle of poverty, and the state of poor people does not improve. It happens because they “do not have the ability – by themselves – to get out of the mess” (Sachs, 2005, p 6). Sixty-seven percent of Ethiopian export revenues come from coffee, and millions of people depend on the industry. The film constantly switches locations from coffee plantations and people who work there in extreme poverty to high-end coffee exhibitions or barista competitions in developed countries. People who participate in the latter activities often have no idea of what the process of harvesting and sorting coffee beans looks like, how many people depend on them, and how low their wages are.
At the end of the film, the authors demonstrate the WTO conference in Mexico where the ministers of trade of African countries were either excluded from negotiations or forced to agree with unfair measures. As a result, people in Africa faced famine, and many coffee farmers in Ethiopia started to replace their coffee plantations with chad, a narcotic plant, the price of which is higher than the one of coffee. Finally, the authors give statistics that if Africa’s share in the international trade increases by one percent, it gives the continent five times more revenue than it currently receives in humanitarian aid. Thus, the international community should help African people to break this vicious circle of poverty by paying them more for their hard work at coffee fields.
The film displays one of the crucial problems of the modern world, which is the extreme poverty in third world countries. The example of Ethiopian farmers who grow coffee beans is not the only one that exists today. The situation when people in Ethiopia started to substitute coffee fields with chad plantations may be regarded as a prerequisite for a severe economic crisis similar to the one in Nicaragua in 2001. The coffee crisis in Nicaragua was caused by the bankruptcy of the coffee farms that provoked the growth of the unemployment rate. Labor and finance sectors in Nicaragua were “disproportionally dependent upon revenues from coffee”, and that is why the crisis was so destructive for the country’s economy (Jackles et al., 2014, p. 3). The situation with chad in Ethiopia may be considered an attempt to gain more revenue and improve the living conditions of the citizens because it costs more than coffee. However, this measure does not solve the problem of poverty in the country since it is impossible to build a strong economy by selling a narcotic plant that is officially banned in many countries.
It will be better to look at the Fair Trade program, which was several times mentioned by Mr. Meskela when he spoke about coffee prices and raising customers’ awareness about their formation. Fair Trade targets giving the disadvantaged producers a chance “increase their control over their own future, have fair and just return for their work” (Murray et al., 2003, p. 1). Though Fair Trade may be unable to completely solve the problem of poverty in the countries of Africa or Latin America, it gives the poor producers of such goods as coffee or bananas avoid additional margins from the part of the middlemen. As a result, people will get more money for their job, and the level of their economic stability will rise. In that case, they will be able to, at least, give their children proper education. It contributes to “a better distribution of the aggregate national income among different people (Sen, 2003, 55). Thus, the Fair Trade program is a good way for people who live in developing countries to, finally, increase their countries’ share in international trade and improve the domestic economic situation.
Taking into account everything mentioned above, it is possible to conclude that the film Black Gold by Mark James Francis and Nick Francis is more than just a documentary about the process of coffee harvesting. It presents a well-described portrait of the coffee industry with all the steps from fields in Ethiopia to the barista competitions in the West countries. The film displays the inequality of the modern world where people who do the major part of the job, such as collecting and sorting coffee beans, get less money than those who distribute the final product. Black Gold also evokes sympathy towards Ethiopian workers since it shows the parts of their daily lives, and people see that they face famine, poor living conditions, and a great amount of hard work. The film helps in raising public awareness of the fact that though the developing countries depend on humanitarian aid from other countries, it is far better if their share in the international trade grows.
References
Francis, M. J. & Francis, N. (2006). Black Gold. [Film]. Speakit Films.
Jackles, S. C., Jackles, C. F., Vallejos, C. & Marsolek, M. (2014). Coffee for justice. Fordham Scholarship Online. Web.
Murray, D., Raynolds, L. T. & Taylor, P. L. (2003). One cup at a time: poverty alleviation and fair trade coffee in Latin America. Colorado State University. Web.
Sachs, J. D. (2005). The end of poverty. Economic possibilities for our time. The Penguin Press.
Sen, A. (2003). Development as capability expansion. Harvard University. Web.