Written by DCist contributor Cynthia Rockwell

Most coffee drinkers are by now aware that for a few extra pennies you can buy beans labeled “Fair trade” and feel a warm glow knowing that you are helping Third world farmers by paying a “fair” price for their crop. In their new documentary Black Gold, British filmmakers Marc and Nick Francis hope to illuminate the complexities of the issue. The film follows the efforts of Tadesse Meskela, the manager of the Oromio coffee farmers’ cooperative in Ethiopia, as he talks, travels, and works night and day to get a living wage for his farmers. Like the recent Academy Award-nominated documentary Darwin’s Nightmare, which took aim at the Nile Perch fishing industry and its disastrous effect on the people of Tanzania, Black Gold attempts to connect the various forces — giant multinational companies, cutthroat commodities markets, government deregulation — which conspire to keep coffee prices oppressively low for farmers.

Much in the style of Errol Morris, the filmmakers take a hands-off approach and let their subjects do the talking — for better or worse. The film opens with images of a professional coffee tasting event where cuppers (professional tasters) proclaim they have found an uncommonly exquisite coffee at the event, possibly the best they’ve ever tasted, an Ethiopian roast. From there the film layers images of the farmers of those beans — 15 people living in one hut with no electricity, no running water, no shoes, no schools for the children to attend — with shots of a flashy worldwide barista competition, breathtaking images of the Ethiopian landscape, and shots of New Yorkers hustling down the street bearing $4 lattes from Starbucks. We also visit some big-name coffee companies and busy commodities exchanges, where officials extol the virtues of their operations and unknowingly hang themselves within the context of the film.

But mostly, it’s Meskela’s story. Through him we learn that the growers of these premium beans are getting less than 23 cents a kilo for their efforts. A kilo makes about 80 cups of coffee, which in America translates to about $240. The farmers say that to improve their lives they would need the price they’re getting for their beans to increase tenfold. And as Meskela notes, that’s just to get clean water and clothes on their back, not to buy “motorcars or scooters.”