For Immediate Release June 13, 2001

Media Contacts: Ronnie Cummins, Organic Consumers Association, (612) 240-1737 or (218) 226-4164 Mark Helm, Friends of the Earth, (202) 783-7400 x 102

CAMPAIGN DIRECTOR RONNIE CUMMINS POLICY BOARD MAUDE BARLOW Council of Canadians JAY FELDMAN National Coalition Against the Misuse of Pesticides NICOLS FOX Author JEAN HALLORAN Consumers Union TIM HERMACH Native Forest Council ELLEN HICKEY Pesticide Action Network JULIA BUTTERFLY HILL Forest Activist and Author ANNIE HOY Ashland Community Food Store (OR) MIKE IBA Network for Safe and Secure Food & Environment Japan PAT KERRIGAN Wedge Co-op (MN) JOHN KINSMAN Family Farm Defenders AL KREBS Agribusiness Examiner BRUCE KRUG NY Dairy Farmer HOWARD LYMAN Voice for a Visible Future CHARLES MARGULIS Greenpeace USA VICTOR MENOTTI Int’l Forum on Globalization ROBIN SEYDEL La Montanita Co-op (NM) VANDANA SHIVA Research Foundation for Science, Technology & Natural Resource Policy, India JOHN STAUBER Ctr for Media & Democracy

ENVIRONMENTAL, HUMAN RIGHTS, & CONSUMER GROUPS DENOUNCE CEO OF STARBUCKS & THE WORLD BANK FOR GREENWASHING ORGANIC CONSUMERS ASSOCIATION, FRIENDS OF THE EARTH, & GLOBAL EXCHANGE WILL HOLD PRESS CONFERENCE AT STARBUCKS (17^th and Pennsylvania) IN WASHINGTON, D.C. AT 10 AM WEDNESDAY, JUNE 13 IMMEDIATELY FOLLOWED BY PICKET LINE AT ENTRANCE OF WORLD BANK SYMPOSIUM ON BIODIVERSITY GROUPS DEMAND STARBUCKS & WORLD BANK STOP SUBSIDIZING COFFEE PLANTATION SWEATSHOPS WHICH HAVE CAUSED A MASSIVE GLOBAL OVERPRODUCTION CRISIS AND ECONOMIC DISASTER FOR 60 MILLION COFFEE WORKERS GROUPS DEMAND THAT STARBUCKS & WORLD BANK PROMOTE FAIR TRADE/SHADE COFFEE AS MARKETPLACE ALTERNATIVE EVENTS ARE PART OF AN ONGOING GLOBAL CAMPAIGN TO DRIVE GENETICALLY ENGINEERED FOODS AND CROPS OFF THE MARKET AND TO PROMOTE FAIR TRADE AND ORGANIC FARMING PRACTICES Washington, D.C. – Public interest groups will hold a press conference at Starbucks (17^th and Pennsylvania Ave. NW) in Washington, D.C. at 10 a.m. on Wednesday, June 13. Groups are denouncing Starbucks, the world’s largest gourmet coffee chain, and the World Bank for promoting and subsidizing coffee plantation sweatshops which have caused a massive overproduction crisis in the world coffee market--resulting in economic disaster and starvation wages for 60 million coffee workers and their families. Immediately following the press conference there will be a picket line one block away at the entrance of the World Bank (18^th & H), where Starbucks CEO Orin Smith and World Bank president James Wolfensohn are speaking on “Conserving Biodiversity.” The Organic Consumers Association, Friends of the Earth, and Global Exchange are demanding that the World Bank stop giving loans to sun grown coffee plantation projects--such as in Vietnam--which exploit workers, damage the environment and contribute to global overproduction, and instead provide significant support for shade grown and organic coffee production which preserves the environment and guarantees small farmers and coffee workers a living wage. Groups are also demanding that Starbucks start purchasing and brewing certified Fair Trade coffee as its “coffee flavor of the day” at least one day a week. Protesters picketed and leafleted Starbucks cafes in 100 cities in the US and Canada on March 20, calling for the company to remove genetically engineered ingredients from its brand name products, to brew and seriously promote Fair Trade coffee, and to fulfill prior company promises to alleviate sweatshop conditions on the coffee plantations of its suppliers. Protests are slated for 200 cities June 25-29. Orin Smith admitted on National Public Radio April 28 that Starbucks’ sales of Fair Trade shade grown coffee are tiny—one tenth of one percent of total coffee sales. “Using words like ‘Starbucks’ and the ‘World Bank’ in the same sentence as ‘conserving biodiversity’ is an obscenity. We intend to expose this greenwashing and hypocrisy and continue our US and international campaigning until companies like Starbucks and institutions like the World Bank change their practices,” stated Ronnie Cummins, National Director of the Organic Consumers Association.”