COFFEE PRICE

COFFEE PRICE

No doubt that coffee price has risen.

Wherever and in whatever way you buy it.

In particular we are paying seven euros more in a short time.

Considering this, my husband set about calculating the difference for us who with a kilo of coffee go over 142 cups on the basis of seven grams each, comparing the cost today and the cost six months ago.

il prezzo del caffèil prezzo del caffè

In general, a controversial and very popular topic is the hypothetical new price of the cup at the café: two euros.

How does price get there?

Lu had already pointed out to me a whole repertoire of common discontents, expressed in more or less colourful ways.

I am very interested in your opinion as a consumer, what do you say?

I thought to consult industry insiders and experts, and I would like to take this opportunity to thank everyone again.

ALTOGA: National Association of Coffee Roasters, Coffee Importers and Food Wholesalers sent me the link to their press review that you can find here

Click then for the file on

comunicato stampa Altoga

The opinion of Martina Mazzoleni, marketing specialist at Caffè Ernani is as follows:

The price of espresso in the next 5/10 years willy-nilly will reach € 2.00, for the following reasons:

  • Increase in the price of the raw material i.e. green coffee, from 2019 to today the price has increased on average by 400%, some coffees have seen peaks of even 600% more.

  • Climate change: there will be more and more people asking for coffee, but there will be less and less coffee available. And by the law of supply and demand when there is more demand and less availability of a resource, the price goes up, it is economics.

  • If we want a fairer catering industry, prices must be increased. We often complain as citizens about the low wages in the restaurant industry (and I am not referring to those who hire non-compliant, etc., those are not entrepreneurs to me), but precisely about the too low wages with the industry’s collective bargaining agreements.

  • Skyrocketing running costs, if in the past it cost X to run this kind of business, today it costs X times 2, so twice as much.

  • Increased shipping costs, it doesn’t look like it but even shipping costs in the best cases have doubled, in the worst cases they have quintupled, so there must be a higher mark-up at the end to be able to pay them.

  • Wars, which created problems precisely because of the previous point, shipping.

  • Pay fairly at origin too, if we want to stop exploiting farmers and pay the right price for green coffee, we must also raise prices to consumers.

  • Apart from Italy, no country still has coffee prices this low, we are lagging behind.

  • With the entry of the new EUDR, even less coffee will be allowed to be imported into Europe, so even higher prices are expected in 2025.

Finally, I understand that consumers rightly cannot afford too high coffee prices, but this is a problem of wages that are not being raised by the state at national level, not of the baristas or coffee roasters who in the last 4 years are simply trying to survive the worst crisis our sector has seen since coffee became a global commodity, i.e. since the 16th century.

Giulia Spinoni of IEI Italian Espresso Institute provided me with a document with an emblematic title: no to instrumentalisation.

Click for the press release

Istituto Espresso Italiano

Trieste Coffee Association you already know it: we talked about the unofficial capital of coffee

Once again I would like to refute the alleged coldness of the north-east: once again I had the privilege of finding maximum availability and exquisite cordiality.

The president: Arianna Mingardi is among those women with whom one is immediately on the same wavelength, where it is the value of people that counts.

I contacted the association in a particularly fervent period for Trieste, so I say stay tuned because we will have the opportunity to chat further on the subject.

To stay for now on the coffee price issue: the president explained to me that, starting with the raw material, i.e. raw coffee, the increases have been slow but continuous, in step with adverse weather conditions.

However, it is not only the price that has risen: consumption has also increased significantly, especially from countries that previously did not consume coffee.

The logistical situation is also very difficult, due to very long waits for transit through the Suez Canal, or alternatively, the circumnavigation of Africa.

Even considering the real speculations that affect this as well as other sectors, the main thing that emerges is the attention paid to the protection of a supply chain that affects the entire territory at various levels, aimed at making coffee a valuable beverage.

Before concluding, I would also like to issue an invitation to our Laura from Al tavolo di Amalia to get the point of view of Naples: what about suspended coffee at the price of two euros?

RELIFE TORINO

RELIFE TORINO

Relife Torino is the new student apartment complex created by transforming the former Lavazza factory

MuseoTorino: the virtual museum of Turin, which we had already visited talking about Bicerin, tells about Lavazza in Corso Novara in Turin from 1965 until 2017.

Then in June 2018, the Lavazza Nuvola is presented. 

Inaugurated last week, Relife Torino is therefore a so-called redevelopment project curated by Turin architect Stefano Seita and studio Lombardini22 on behalf of a Swiss company: RELIFE Nation.

Relife bases its concept on the social economy through the RELIFE Foundation which has the ambition to contribute concretely to the improvement of society by ‘creating a bridge between the academic world and the third sector.’

The presentation campaign was curated by FUD Design, brand of Lombardini22.

Out of home logo including a QRcode depicted through urban floor graffiti curated by GreenGraffiti

It all sounds very nice.

But there is no shortage of controversy: the flats are rather expensive and certainly not affordable for all students.

The message was sent back to the sender again in the form of writing on the walls.

In your opinion, can we really talk about a better society if it is expensive?

While you tell me your student experience, shall we have a Lavazza this time?

 

BABY FORMULA

BABY FORMULA

The Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act (FFDCA) defines infant formula: “Baby Formula” as a food that purports to be or is represented for special dietary use exclusively as infant formula by reason of its simulation of human milk or its suitability as a complete food or partial substitute for human milk.

It may seem strange, but in the United States the various brands of Baby Formula on the market are produced almost exclusively by the same company: Abbott Nutrition

Leaving aside issues of monopoly, this caused a huge problem when the U.S. Food and Drug Administration’s (FDA) Coordinated Outbreak Response and Evaluation (CORE) network, along with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and state and local partners investigated consumer complaints and/or reports received by the FDA from September 2021 to February 2022 regarding illnesses among infants who allegedly consumed infant formula products from Abbott Nutrition’s Sturgis, MI, facility, advising consumers not to consume milk powder from certain batches.

Abbott initiated a voluntary, proactive recall of powdered formulas, including Similac, Alimentum and EleCare, manufactured in Sturgis, Michigan, one of the company’s manufacturing facilities.

Consumer complaints were related to Cronobacter sakazakii or Salmonella Newport found in infants who had consumed powdered infant formula produced at this facility.

This resulted in a drastic difficulty in sourcing powdered milk precisely because of the fact that virtually most of the production is from the same facility.

This is a huge problem, since infants whose mothers are not fortunate enough to have breast milk cannot feed on anything else.

Real special flights have been set up to solve this emergency: Open Fly Formula

A protocol has been initiated to transport infant formula via an airlift procured by the DOD i.e., the Department of Defense.

The company that produces this infant formula reports that in order to move the infant formula from Zurich, Switzerland, to Plainfield, Indiana, in the United States, it takes about 21 days with a commercial plane to ship and clear customs so that it can enter distribution.

Instead, the cargo was transferred from Switzerland to Ramstein to be loaded onto two C-17s on Bravo alert in Germany and through USTRANSCOM i.e., U.S. Transportation Command, the transport was done under the auspices of this sort of motto:
Regardless of whether the needs are in Ukraine, India or even here at home, from deploying combat-credible forces, to providing vaccines, food, water and supplies during a pandemic or natural disaster, USTRANSCOM will provide.

Can you tell me exactly what “combat-credible” means?

Undoubtedly the milk emergency had to be solved, what puzzles me is the mixing of “aid” and “military.”

Meanwhile, a kind of chain of solidarity was created among parents to find advice through Facebook groups in which, however, scammers and profiteers took over.

How did we do it before milk powder existed? I wonder, too.
Were nannies the only alternative?

SHRINKFLATION

SHRINKFLATION

Shrinkflation is the situation where the price of a product remains the same but its size shrinks.

Unfortunately many products have been affected by shrinkage

Basically, a clever way to covertly raise prices by downsizing the content.

Many examples are listed in this video by The Wall Street Journal

 

I had already talked about the disappointment of finding a few cookies in deceptive packages that suggest larger quantities, but here we are facing a procedure for which a complaint has been filed to one hundred and four powers of attorney to ascertain that it is not part of the crime of fraud

All this fits into a context that raises serious concern: the ISTAT publishes the provisional inflation data in April 2022 equal to 6.2% on a annua, and FAO complaint how world food commodity prices have made a significant leap in March to reach the highest levels ever.

The report Effects and expectations on inflation edited by IPSOS for FederDistribuzione of March 2022 does not reveal anything that we cannot imagine on our own: the main concerns of Italians are employment and the economy, as illustrated by this chart.

With my anxiety I certainly spoil the excess, but you are optimistic, right?

How do you go about purchasing?
Do you notice the weight of the product?
Have you had the opportunity to directly observe any cases of shrinkflation?

REPAIR CAFÉ

REPAIR CAFÉ

Repair Café is a fantastic idea that was born in Amsterdam in 2009 by Martine Postma.

But what is a Repair Café?

It is not just a hangout.

It is not just volunteering.

Repair Cafè has a very important social function.

Repair Café is a free meeting place where you can repair objects of all kinds together.

Repair Café is an organization that provides tools and materials to help carry out repairs on clothes, furniture, appliances, bicycles, dishes, appliances, toys, and much more thanks to the availability of experienced volunteers, with repair skills in all types of fields.

The success in the Netherlands has spread over space and time, forming a worldwide movement with the express purpose of preserving the ability to repair in society and promoting the recovery of objects that can continue to function.

There are organizations in Belgium, Germany, France, the United Kingdom, the United States, India, Japan and many other countries around the world

In this video Martine, Ginko and Therese explain also giving numbers

Isn’t it wonderful that coffee machines are among the most sheltered objects?

There is also a Repair Café in Pavia founded in 2015 by Irishman Mike Kavanagh and Australian Michael Richards.

The team, which also takes care of teaching the knowledge needed to repair, has since grown and organizes repair events in collaboration with various local associations.

In this regard, I would like to point out the appointment on Saturday 26 February: Activators Breakfast

Are you for reuse
Can you fix broken objects?
Is there a particular object to which you have given or would you like to give new life?

What if I tell you 金継ぎor kintsugi?

FUNGHI ESPRESSO – MUSHROOM EXPRESS

FUNGHI ESPRESSO – MUSHROOM EXPRESS

Your comments show that many of us use coffee grounds to fertilize plants, and this is undoubtedly a good thing.

But there are those who, before fertilizing the plants, use the coffee grounds collected from the local cafes to cultivate.

Well yes: it is a landless cultivation, only with coffee grounds, and it produces mushrooms!

These mushrooms are then sold in local fairs or in local restaurants: in Tuscany.

What better name than Espresso Mushrooms

Among other things, ironically, this business was born in a former shoe factory

The project was presented to UNIFI Impresa Campus in 2013 here you can find the spin off  of the Florentine University Incubator and the newsletter which decides its success.

Funghi Espresso then participated in Expo 2015  receiving consensus and acknowledgments.

Mushrooms Espresso is inspired by Gunter Pauli‘s Blue economy  becoming part of the concept of Smart city, but even more of Urban farming.

Antonio Di Giovanni, one of the creators of the Startup Mushrooms Espresso, is also the founder of Circular Farm whose production cycle illustrates in detail the composting process and hydroponic cultivation.

Have you already tried the hydroponic method, that is, out of the ground?

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