Brad's blog - day two

Aguadas Town

Just as I'm about to leave the hotel, dressed in my muddy red shorts, our luggage arrives. A few members of the team travelled down to the bus at 5am, somehow negotiated the mudslide and carried our cases and the camera equipment back to the hotel on their heads. So, it's back to my room to change into something more fitting for a day of meetings.

Aguadas is a remote and pretty town high in the Andes and home to the Aguadas Coffee Co-operative. Today I meet the 47 elected delegates who represent the farmers, in order to outline the UK consumer perspective on Fairtrade and the role that we and our members have played in driving awareness and sales.

While the delegates are very familiar with how Fairtrade is supporting themselves and fellow coffee farmers, they had no idea that half the world away fellow co-operators are playing their part in promoting Fairtrade with such vigour and passion. Over lunch I join a special meeting of the board and exchange views and information with the 10 members; we learn much from each other.

The meetings give me a real buzz and my concerns of travelling to Colombia, with its well-documented security problems for travellers, evaporate. I now feel safe and in the presence of friends.

In the afternoon I'm taken across the road to see the co-operative’s qualities lab – paid for by Fairtrade premiums. I learn more about the focus that the co-operative places on maximising quality of the coffee and the ongoing training and education of the farmers.

A very educational day indeed, but I'm looking forward to tomorrow even more, when I'll be visiting a secondary school built with Fairtrade premiums, and meeting some of its pupils.

Day three