BONN, Germany – The Instituto de Manejo e Certificação Florestal e Agrícola ( IMAFLORA ), a leading conservation organisation in Brazil, and the 4C Association, the global platform for sustainable coffee, have entered into an innovative partnership to define joint efforts and expand their collaboration in Brazil.
Through a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU), IMAFLORA and the 4C Association are joining forces to create synergies and optimise resource use with the objective of supporting sustainable production in the Brazilian coffee sector.
As a key component of the collaboration agreement, IMAFLORA is hosting the the 4C Association’s new Manager Brazil at its ecologically designed offices in Piracicaba/SP.
Thanks to this, the 4C Manager Brazil is able to use IMAFLORA’s office infrastructure to maintain closer contact with Brazilian members of the 4C Association, provide them with core services and promote the Association’s priority activities.
“The 4C Association sees the collaboration with IMAFLORA as a unique and innovative partnership that will enable us to increase joint efforts with other standards and efficiently use scarce resources for the benefit of our members in Brazil,” said Melanie Rutten-Sülz, Executive Director of the 4C Association.
Another key component of the collaboration is to support continuous improvement towards sustainability, joining efforts from both organisations to facilitate the enabling conditions for coffee farmers and their business partners to “step up” from the 4C entry level to the advanced Rainforest Alliance/SAN compliance level.
“We believe in the potential of the 4C Association to promote entry level sustainability practices in coffee through its 4C standard and verification system.
This partnership is an important step to bring more and more farmers to the sustainability starting line and prepare them to comply with the Sustainable Agriculture Network Standard and achieve the Rainforest Alliance Certification” Mr. Mauricio Voivodic, IMAFLORA’s Executive Director.
