Level Ground Trading TRADING FAIRLY AND DIREtCTLY TO OFFER YOUR CUSTOMERS ETHICAL CHOICES
Level Ground Trading was founded in 1997 by four Canadian families for the purpose of improving the lives of disadvantaged farmers through trade.
LEVEL GROUND TRADING OFFERS AN ARRAY OF THE BEST POSSIBLE QUALITY direct fair trade goods, CONNECTED TO A CORE SET OF values
With every product, Level Ground invests utmost care into their farmers, quality, transparency, and environmental impact.
- Create opportunities for economically disadvantaged producers by supporting small-scale producers that establish direct trade relationships based on trust and respect by visiting producers regularly.
- Pay a fair price and invest social premiums in the farmer's community.
- Source high quality ingredients while investing in quality control and organic practices.
- Pay the highest price for the highest quality coffee and other products.
- Publish extensive details for every container purchased and track trading partnerships for all to view.
- Purchase directly from farmer co-ops and their trading partners.
- Believe in organic, both for the benefits it brings farmers and for the way it makes their own practices more environmentally friendly.
- Run under a zero-to-landfill mandate at their production facility on Vancouver Island. They use 13 different streams of recycling and compost all organics.
- Created a 100% compostable coffee package and partnered with over 100 stores across Western Canada to assist them in reclaiming their packaging.
COFFEE
"We shake the hands that pick the coffee"
Level Ground purchases coffee from small associations of small-scale farmers. Its mission is to participate actively in the economic development of the regions of its growers.
They import their coffee from six countries, offering you a wide range of delicious tasting notes and roasts.
Level Ground roasts all of their coffees using a fluid bed air roaster (uniform convection heat) in order to:
- Roast for shorter periods with a consistent, convective heat that locks in flavor and aroma for a consistent roast and quality of taste.
- Filter off the chaff (skin) of the coffee bean entirely, meaning that nothing is “burnt” on. This results in a much cleaner bean for a smoother, less bitter taste in the resulting brew.
TEAS
- Loose leaf tea
- Hand plucked
- Hand processed
- Small-scale cultivation
- No chemicals
Level Ground Trading currently purchases tea from nine small tea gardens in Assam, India. Each garden is 1 - 3 acres in size and provides the main income for the tea growers and laborers.
The Small Tea Coop is the link between the tea growers and Level Ground Trading. Each year gardens are visited to check on organic practices, meet with laborers, distribute fair trade premiums and build capacity for tea processing.
DRIED FRUIT
There are no additives or sulphides used in the preservation process of their fruit; it is preserved simply through air-drying.
Level Ground purchases dried fruit and cane sugar from Fruandes, a Fair Trade organization koperating out of Bogotá, Colombia. Fruandes purchases fresh fruit from independent farmers or associations of small-scale farmers.
What began as a desire to address the hard-hit coffee community transformed into a dual mission to protect the marginalized women struggling to survive in Cazuca. Today, there are up to 45 women employed by Fruandes during peak fruit processing periods and they receive around nine containers of dried fruit and sugar a year.
RICE
These rice cultivars come from heirloom seeds, saved by Indigenous tribes for over 2000 years.
Rice Inc. is Level Ground's trading partner for importing these heirloom rice varieties. Rice Inc is a non-profit organization independent region@"me al cooperative of farmers with 50 - 150 members each selling to RICE Inc.
RICE = Revitalizing Indigenous Cordillera Entrepreneurs.
"OUR VISION IS TO ALLEVIATE POVERTY IN DEVELOPING COUNTRIES THROUGH DIRECT FAIR TRADE."
UPLIFT THE WORLD THROUGH your own PARTNERSHIP WITH LEVEL GROUND TRADING
