2024 Bonus Member Spotlight: Frontier Co-op
Oct 31, 2024
As National Cooperative month concludes in the U.S., enjoy this bonus spotlight on our member, Frontier Co-op, celebrating smallholder farmers and cooperative partnerships.
Celebrating National Co-op Month: Empowering Smallholder Farmers through Cooperative Partnerships
At Frontier Co-op, we’ve always been dedicated to fostering the resilience of smallholder farmers, and the cooperative model along with fair trade practices plays a key role in that mission.
Smallholder farmers are the backbone of global agriculture. Around the world, 600 million farmers operate on less than two hectares of land, yet they contribute roughly 30% of the world’s food supply (World Economic Forum).
This includes the global spice supply chain, where their work is critical to the products Frontier Co-op brings to market. These farmers not only grow the natural and organic spices, herbs, and botanicals that end up on our shelves but also play a pivotal role in preserving biodiversity, protecting their local economy, and ensuring food security for their communities.
As a company, we recognize the importance of trading commodities fairly and supporting these farmers in ways that create long-term sustainability. That’s why our partnership with USAID’s Cooperative Development Program through our Safe Processing in Cooperative Enterprises (SPICE) project has been such an important part of our source development work since 2018. This multi-year project was designed to support smallholder farmers in Sri Lanka, India, and Guatemala, helping them overcome infrastructure challenges, skills or technology gaps, and climate-related pressures.
The cooperative model empowers farmers and their communities to take control of their futures. Working with partners like Sri Lanka’s Small Organic Farmers’ Association (SOFA), Fedecovera RL in Guatemala, and Young Mountain Tea (YMT) in India, we’ve seen firsthand the deep and lasting impact this approach can have.
Read the full blog by Alicia Simmons’, Senior Sustainability Manager, on LinkedIn.
A Deep Dive into 5 Years of SPICE
Frontier Co-op recently wrapped up their five-year USAID Cooperative Development Program, Safe Processing in Cooperative Enterprise (SPICE). Their video series provides a way to see how this joint investment drove impact in the lives of smallholder farmers in Frontier Co-op’s sourcing communities around the globe – from Coban, Guatemala to Sri Lanka and rural northern India.
Interested in a specific country?
View individual country videos below:
India
Sri Lanka
Guatemala
Tony Bedard, Frontier Co-op CEO, Inducted into the Cooperative Hall of Fame
The U.S. Overseas Cooperative Development Council congratulates Tony Bedard on his 2024 induction into the Cooperative Hall of Fame!
By championing the idea that doing good in the world and growing a financially successful business is not mutually exclusive, Tony Bedard has been instrumental in realizing Frontier Co-op’s stated purpose; that “Doing Good, Works.”