Price Crisis Response Initiative Part 5

PART 5: SCA APPROACH

(these are my personal notes from reading through the SCA price crisis response initiative to be used for a summary for my clients and coffee friends)

Specialty coffee faces complex and interrelated challenges. Many of the fundamental systems underpinning the sector are entrenching inequality and unsustainable practices. They need to change these underlying systems which can include:

-        Policies

-        Routines

-        Relationships

-        Resources

-        Power structures

-        Values

We need to understand the system and find points of leverage- the areas where we can have maximum impact with minimum effort. The most powerful would be to shift culture and psychology to shift paradigms.

BEST PRACTICE

Important to:

-        Deliver change in long term, not short term fix

-        Recognise interdependence of trends and issues

-        System mapping exercise to understand current system

-        Identifies (with intent to avoid) unintended potential consequences from shifting the system.

-        Highlight assumptions that need to be tested

-        Ensure the changes are viable at a global scale

-        Deliver structural change to shift behaviour across industry, not intervene at a scale of individual business models…

PLACES TO INTERVENE

These have been identified as key places to intervene:

12. contants, parameters, numbers

11. size of buffers and other stabilising stocks relative to their flows

10. structure of material stocks and flows

9. length of delays relative to the rate of system change

8. strength of negative feedback loops, relative to impacts they are trying to correct against

7. gain driving positive feedback loops

6. structure of information flows

5. rules of the system

4. power to add, change, evolve or self-organise system structure

3. goals of the system

2. mindset or paradigm out of which system- its goals ,structure, rules, delays, parameter- arises

1. power to transcend paradigms

RESEARCH PRINCIPLES OF SCA

-        Collaborative

-        Inclusive of diverse opinions

-        Open

-        Future focussed

-        Action orientated

ACTIONS/STEPS TAKEN FOR RESEARCH

These are the steps taken in this research project by the SCA:

1.     Define problem and vision

2.     Identify ‘no regrets’ actions that are immediate actions to address crisis

3.     Explore root causes- iceburg

4.     Map the system to gain clarity

5.     Landscape assessment- what has/hasn’t worked in what we have already tried in the coffee industry/adjacent industries

6.     Explore role of specialty industry

7.     Explore where SCA is well placed to catalyse change

8.     Synthesize recommendations

Read the full SCA Research document here