Our contact, Katie, has worked stateside for the company Guayaki for 10 years. In case you aren't familiar with Guayaki, they sell yerba mate drinks as well as loose leaf yerba mate. I admire their commitment to sustainability and social impact. Here are a few excerpts from their website to illustrate their mindset:
"Guayakí stands for a new model of regenerative business that reaches deep and wide across our supply web to regenerate the life, health and future prosperity of the social and ecological systems that we touch."
"Guayakí’s 2020 mission is to steward and restore 200,000 acres of South American Atlantic rainforest and create over 1,000 living wage jobs. To accomplish this, we take a co-participatory approach to working with approximately 1,100 families in three nations to grow yerba mate. This approach allows for the redistribution of wealth and avoids concentration of power."
The Ache are traditionally hunter-gatherers, and are deeply in tune with the forest. They have only been living on this reservation since the mid-70's because of a series of land-grabs and nasty development. Guayaki partners with them to cultivate yerba mate among all the other plants in the forest. This method produces a superior shade-grown product as well as promotes preservation of the rainforest by maintaining biodiversity.
As it turns out, the name Guayaki is actually the indigenous tribe name of these native people (Ache is what others have called them). The company has set up a fund for all the royalties associated with this name, and the community meets to decide how their needs should be met. Last year, a yurt was built as a school. In fact, a previous Whole Foods Market Team Member Volunteer Program group got to participate in building it. This year, we did several other small community service projects.
