Ethical Coffee & Coffee Beans

Find sustainable and ethical coffee

Coffee is edging close to ending the era of the UK being a nation of tea drinkers. 

And there is growing interest in finding out about sustainable and ethical coffee brands, with issues such as where and how is it grown, who grew it, and how was it sourced being important. 

This guide contains many of the major brands found on shop shelves and online stores, alongside a selection of sustainably branded speciality brands. We rate 30 brands, including big names in the coffee industry like Nestle' with its Nespresso pods, along with coffee shops who sell their own coffee, like Costa, Starbucks and Cafe Nero. Plus small and often very ethical brands like Cafedirect, Grumpy Mule, Revolver World and Source Climate Change coffee. 

There are far too many speciality coffee companies in the UK to cover in a single guide, but we hope that you can apply the guidance here to your favourite niche brands.

The guide covers instant, ground coffee and beans, pods and coffee bags. 

Inequality in the coffee industry 

Coffee is an incredibly valuable export product for developing countries but local producers receive a bitter deal – particularly the smallholders who grow 96% of the world's coffee. Producers often receive less than 10% of the total value in the supply chain, with some estimates suggesting farmers earn only 1% of a cup of coffee’s retail price.

Almost all of the world’s beans come from equatorial countries in the so-called “Coffee Belt”, and many of those countries rely on development aid.

The structural power inequalities are clear. Large multinational corporations – roasters, traders, and retailers – exercise disproportionate market power, setting prices and terms of trade that disadvantage small-scale farmers.

This model means that coffee’s profits barely filter through to local growing communities.

But fortunately, there are many brands that are challenging this exploitative model. This guide will separate the ethical beans from the chaff, highlighting the brands that give producers a better deal and those that continue to hoard profits.

Supermarket own brands and ethical coffee

We didn’t rate supermarkets for this guide, but you can refer to our supermarkets guide to see how they all score. 

The Co-op and Waitrose achieved the highest ranking, followed by Marks & Spencer. Their superiority over the rest of the high-street supermarkets is reflected in their coffee certifications too: all own-brand coffee products from Co-op, Waitrose, and M&S are Fairtrade certified. 

Many other supermarket own-brand coffee products are also certified, some by Fairtrade International, but most by the somewhat weaker Rainforest Alliance. We discuss fair trade certifications further below.

Who sells what?

Some coffee brands focus on just one type of coffee product, whilst others offer a range of options including coffee pods compatible with popular coffee machines.

Supermarkets sell their own-brand coffee products. Although they are not rated in the guide, below is a list of what they currently sell.

• Aldi: instant, ground, whole beans
• Asda: instant ground, whole beans, coffee pods
• Co-operative: instant, ground, whole beans
• Lidl: instant, ground, whole beans
• Marks & Spencer: instant, ground, whole beans, coffee pods
• Morrisons: instant, ground, whole beans, coffee pods
• Ocado: instant, ground, whole beans, coffee pods
• Sainsbury's: instant, ground, whole beans, coffee pods
• Tesco: instant, ground, whole beans, coffee pods
• Waitrose: instant, ground, whole beans, coffee pods

What is ethical sustainable coffee?

The coffee industry is awash with ethical claims and certification schemes – some of which are shared with the tea industry - which we write about in separate feature article. 

Along with generic certifications such as fair trade, direct trade, and organic there are some coffee-specific certifications such as shade-grown or bird-friendly.

We cover all these topics, along with other ethical issues such as the carbon footprint of coffee production, workers' rights in the supply chain, and if any coffee companies are connected to the Israeli genocide in Gaza.

Organic coffee

In Brazil, the world's largest coffee producer, chemical pesticide use increased by 190% in a single decade. Pesticides, insecticides, and fungicides reduce biodiversity (by killing off everything but the target crop) and contaminate the soil and groundwater causing further biodiversity loss and posing a health risk to humans and animals.

Companies that source organic coffee commit to avoiding synthetic pesticides.

What are brands doing about pesticide use and coffee production?

The following brands are fully organic: 

• Bird & Wild
• Cafe Rebelde Zapatista
• Cafédirect
• Clipper
• CRU Kafe
• Equal Exchange
• Grumpy Mule
• Source Climate Change
• Suma. 

Many companies offer some organic products.

Some non-organic companies have committed to reducing their pesticide usage and preventing agricultural runoff. These are Illy, TrueStart, and Union Hand Roasted Coffee.

Starbucks has similar commitments on pesticide use but not on agricultural runoff (it says it does not use pesticides on the Highly Hazardous Pesticide List). 

Nestlé’s commitments have been rebuffed by an investigation that revealed that pesticides banned in the EU are being exported and used on Nestlé farms in Brazil.

The carbon footprint of coffee

The majority of coffee's carbon footprint, up to 90%, is generated before the coffee beans even leave the farm.

By some estimates, when conventionally produced coffee has the same carbon footprint as cheese, and half that of beef.

While this may be hard to take in for avid coffee drinkers, as discussed earlier there are more sustainable ways to grow and consume coffee.

Shade-grown and organic coffee has the lowest carbon footprint. The forests and soil around shade-grown coffee sequester carbon dioxide rather than releasing it through deforestation.

Organic coffee avoids synthetic fertilisers, and shade-grown coffee also requires less fertiliser, which has been identified as one of the largest contributors to coffee’s climate impact.

Exporting the beans by cargo ship rather than aeroplane can further cut the carbon footprint of coffee. Cafeology routes shipping containers in a way that it can utilise the UK rail network and reduce the carbon footprint of transport by 50% by not using lorries.

Coffee packaging only accounts for about 3% of a cup of coffee’s carbon footprint. 

A recent study by a team of researchers at the University of Quebec published surprising results: in spite of the extra packaging and waste associated with coffee pods, they can be more climate friendly than traditionally brewed coffee. This is primarily because, on average, most greenhouse gas emissions are produced when the coffee is grown, so how much coffee you use matters. Pre-filled coffee pods help prevent the excessive use of coffee and water.

This doesn't mean that you should buy a pod machine as there are other issues associated with them, most notably the coffee pods themselves, which are single use and need to be disposed of. We write about the environmental impact of coffee pods and recycling schemes below.

Another coffee machine that regulates that amount of coffee you use (and makes great tasting coffee!) is the Moka pot. This device lasts a long time and doesn’t result in packaging waste each time it is used.

Finally, you can reduce the carbon footprint of your coffee by drinking it black or adding plant-based milk instead of dairy. Read more about this in the coffee shop guide. 

Climate rating of coffee brands

Only a minority of companies demonstrated net zero-aligned targets and transparent reporting for all emissions scopes, while others struggled to move beyond basic emission reduction goals. 

We awarded additional marks to companies that were focused on agroforestry, shade-grown, and Bird Friendly coffee.

Best scoring for climate actions (with 60 or more points out of 100 for climate) were:

• Bird & Wild
• Clipper
• Source Climate Change
• Suma
• Union Hand Roasted

Some brand managed to not score any points for climate actions. These were:

• Caffè Nero
• Costa
• Starbucks

The environmental impact of coffee

Coffee production is on the rise.

Annual production now stands at 11 million tons and it's expected to triple by 2050. As demand grows, pressure on tropical forests is intensifying as farmers expand cultivation into newly deforested areas while battling adverse weather conditions.

While deforestation and high chemical inputs fuel global heating, climate change is having a well-documented, severe impact on coffee farming in return. In spite of this, the vast majority of coffee is still produced on monoculture farms, which might offer high yields initially, but are more vulnerable to adverse weather and diseases.

One way in which some companies are addressing these issues is agroforestry, where agricultural produce is grown in a diverse forest environment. As we discuss late, over half a dozen companies in this guide sell shade-grown coffee.

The Rainforest Alliance certification also promotes climate-smart growing methods. Caffè Nero, Costa, and Taylors of Harrogate sell 100% Rainforest Alliance-certified coffee, while Cafeology, Carte Noire, Lavazza, Löfbergs, and Percol offer some Rainforest Alliance-certified products.

See our separate feature article for more information about certifications and their limitations.

Coffee growing and sourcing 

The sourcing decisions of individual companies are not going to reverse the deep inequities embedded in coffee supply chains, but they can improve farmers’ livelihoods and signal demand for better practices.

Our new coffee rating rewards sourcing practices which protect workers and the ecosystems that they live and work in. This includes shade-grown coffee, bird-friendly coffee, fair trade, and direct trade options.

Shade-grown coffee vs sun-grown coffee

We awarded 20 additional marks to shade-grown coffee brands. 

Coffee is considered “shade grown” when it grows under a canopy of trees. This preserves biodiversity by creating habitats for wildlife, improving soil health, and preventing deforestation, which is often required for sun-grown coffee farms.

It also helps mitigate climate change as more trees means more carbon is extracted from the air. While this system offers a lower yield, this is offset by lower costs for fertilisers and pesticides and reduced susceptibility to climate change, so provides greater long-term sustainability.

Shade-grown coffee is core to:

• Bird & Wild
• Cafe Rebelde Zapatista
• Cafeology
• CRU Kafe
• Equal Exchange
• Revolver World
• Source Climate Change
• TrueStart.

Bird Friendly coffee

Of the shade-grown brands, Bird & Wild and Cafeology also sell Bird Friendly coffee. This certification is the environmental gold standard in sustainable coffee production.

Bird Friendly coffee is sourced from agroforestry systems where the combination of the canopy, varied tree height, and animal diversity provides suitable migratory bird habitats while maintaining productive farms.

You can watch a video of how coffee is grown in Bird Friendly-certified farms on the website of the Smithsonian Institute, which created the certification.

Fair trade

There are a range of fair trade-related certifications used by coffee companies, which we explain in more detail in a separate article on certification schemes. Points were awarded as follows: 

• 50 points were available for companies which were fully Fairtrade or Fair for Life certified.
• 40 points were available for Rainforest Alliance certification, which we deem to be less rigorous.
• Fewer marks were awarded if a lower percentage of a company’s output was certified, or if it had vague or uncertified evidence of fair trading practices.

The following brands only sold Fairtrade coffee: Cafédirect, Clipper, CRU Kafe, and Suma.

Of the supermarkets own-brand coffee the following fair trade certifications apply:

• All Fairtrade: Co-op, M&S, and Waitrose.
• Some Fairtrade and some Rainforest Alliance: Morrisons, Sainsbury's, and Tesco.
• All Rainforest Alliance: Asda, Lidl, Ocado
• Some own-brand coffee Rainforest Alliance: Aldi

Direct trade coffee

Some of the highest scoring companies were engaged in direct trading relationships with coffee growers. This is where roasters work directly with farmers, bypassing intermediaries, and it often provides higher compensation and greater transparency than certification schemes like Fairtrade. Unlike Fairtrade, however, direct trade isn't certified, so companies can use the term loosely.

Essential Trading’s Cafe Rebelde, Equal Exchange, Grind, Source Climate Change, and Union Hand Roasted Coffee provided convincing descriptions of their direct trade models, and each demonstrated that they pay significantly above Fairtrade prices.

Highlights include Cafe Rebelde, which sources 100% directly from Zapatista autonomous communities in Chiapas, Mexico, while Equal Exchange provides pre-harvest financing to help growers weather market volatility, among manyother important initiatives.

Illy also uses direct trading but did not demonstrate systematically higher payments to farmers than Fairtrade premiums, so scored lower in the ranking.

If you are looking at a direct trade coffee that is not in this guide, look for roasters that publish specific farm names, visit producers regularly, and explain their pricing models.

If they lack these, their claims may not be as good as they sound. Consider contacting those companies directly with questions about sourcing, pricing, and farmer compensation. Consumer feedback shows companies what their customers expect and will hopefully push them in that direction.

Supply chain labour abuses

Cheap coffee probably reflects exploitation somewhere in the supply chain, be it underpaid farmers, poor labour conditions, or environmental degradation. So it's unsurprising that many multinational brands with low-price offerings perform poorly when it comes to identifying, remedying, and reporting supply chain abuses including forced and underpaid labour, lack of protection for migrant workers, and exploitative recruitment practices.

Seven brands score 0 for both our Workers and Coffee Sourcing ratings. These were:

• Douwe Egberts
• L’Or
• Nescafé
• Percol
• Senseo
• Starbucks
• Tassimo. 

Starbucks stands out even among this ignominious list, having been subject to significant lawsuits and negative attention for allegedly sourcing coffee from farms where human rights and labour abuses have occurred.

Despite claims of “100% ethical sourcing”, Starbucks has, as recently as October 2025, faced allegations of slave labour in its supply chain. According to investigative outlet Repórter Brasil, 20 workers were rescued from conditions analogous to slavery in August 2021.

New evidence obtained by the paper in 2025 indicates that even after the slave-labour case, the plantation remained certified by C.A.F.E. Practices, Starbucks’ own programme for assessing whether suppliers are upholding workers’ rights. Starbucks did not even comment on the specific case in its response to the allegations, instead just providing generic information about its coffee-sourcing responsibility policies in Brazil. It remains one of our companies to avoid.

Is coffee ‘Grown by women’ better ethically?

When it comes to coffee production, as in many sectors, women do much of the work but have less of the power.

It has been estimated that women account for around 70% of the share of labour in the global production of coffee but only 20–30% of coffee farms are operated by women. According to the non-profit organisation Equal Origins, women “have less access than their male counterparts to vital resources, including adequate remuneration, land, credit, agricultural inputs, training, information and leadership opportunities.”

But change is happening. According to the Partnership for Gender Equity Founder & CEO Kimberly Easson: “There is a growing recognition of women’s role in coffee and how it helps to drive and push the sustainability of the sector.”

From the buyer’s end, one example featured in this guide is Equal Exchange, a company that has developed its “Grown by Women” coffee range. The beans are sourced exclusively from female members of partner cooperatives and are fully traceable. 

Can coffee packaging be recycled?

While instant coffee typically comes in easily recyclable glass or aluminium jars, the packaging of whole beans/ground coffee and single-serve pods are often made of hard-to-recycle composite or multi-layer materials. Most companies use this type of packaging which requires specialist collection for recycling, for example by TerraCycle.

Packaging made from LDPE plastic, which requires only a single layer, is easier to recycle. These bags are not commonly accepted in curbside recycling bins but can be recycled at supermarket soft plastic collection points. To identify these bags, look for a "recycle" triangle with a number "4" in it. Bird & Wild, Cafédirect, and Equal Exchange, for example, use this type of packaging.

Some coffee bags are produced using polylactic acid, a biodegradable material derived from the fermentation of maize or sugarcane. These are composted in industrial composting facilities. Polylactic acid doesn't have a universal sign but bags often say PLA on them. Grind's coffee bags, for example, are made of this compostable material.

However, as each borough has its own recycling schemes, you need to refer to your local recycling guidelines to determine what is recyclable or compostable in your area.

Coffee pod waste 

Coffee pods have surged in popularity in recent years. According to one estimate, 12.5 million households own a coffee pod machine in the UK and every second coffee machine sold is a pod-based system.

Although the carbon footprint of pod coffee may be smaller than filter coffee, it generates significantly more waste. The world's annual coffee capsule waste is over half a million tons.

The issue of this waste has divided consumers since the pod machine's rise in popularity. The biggest names, including Nespresso and Tassimo created "Podback" – a free service to recycle used coffee capsules.

More ethical companies, such as Grind, Revolver World, and Source Climate Change sell home-compostable capsules.

Other companies, such as Lavazza, also jumped on the compostable bandwagon but were fined by the Advertising Standards Authority for false messaging as their pods could only be composted in an industrial setting.

Make sure before chucking your pod in your compost that it is certified home compostable.

Is all coffee vegan friendly?

We didn't apply our Animal Products rating to coffee brands – none of these companies produce Kopi luwak, the Indonesian speciality coffee infamous for having been digested by the catlike Asian palm civet.

All of the coffee brands in this guide are technically vegan, but vegans may have an issue with coffee which has been produced in a way that leads to deforestation, habitat loss, and biodiversity decline. Supporting Bird Friendly coffee, as sold by Bird & Wild and Cafeology, is a good way to ensure that your morning brew does limited harm to the animal world.

Locally roasted red herrings?

Speciality brands in any sector share a tendency to emphasise how “local” and “artisan” they are, a useful point of differentiation from their faceless multinational competition. Coffee is no different – you’ll see no shortage of “locally roasted” taglines from companies in this guide, often accompanied by images of strapping men with rugged yet perfectly manicured beards, delicately prising hot beans from complex machinery.

There is nothing wrong with roasting locally. It ensures that the coffee you buy has supported local and often smaller businesses in the UK, but this can be something of a red herring with regard to the sustainability of the coffee. 

Shouldn’t the real “local” be the actual country of origin, where the coffee beans were grown?

The premiums paid to coffee farmers and producers are a fraction of the value earned when coffee is sold to consumers. Therefore, labels like “locally roasted” don’t directly benefit the producer. Roasting and packaging is more lucrative than just growing raw beans, but those spoils are generally enjoyed by western companies.

It is commonly argued that, due to factors concerning product freshness, quality and logistics, coffee sold in ground or whole-bean form needs to be roasted closer to the point of sale, hence roasting generally happens in the Global North.

However, there can be social and environmental benefits to roasting coffee beans in their country of origin. 

One is that it makes them lighter to transport, which means less fuel is used to transport the same amount of coffee. Another is that coffee roasting in the country of origin can help lift coffee prices and create more value at origin. By shifting back some of the value-adding activities like roasting and packaging to coffee-growing countries, we can increase those countries’ earning capacity. (Much like with value-added-at-source chocolate.)

Can I get roasted-at-origin coffee in the UK?

It's rare for UK coffee brands to sell beans roasted in the producing country, and none of the companies in this guide offered this at the time of writing. Some brands may occasionally offer "roasted-at-origin" coffees as limited editions or through third-party partners, but these are not widely available.

There are, however, a few European roasted-at-origin brands emerging. We came across Moyee Coffee and Coffee Annan, which serve European markets. They are not widely available in the UK but can be shipped over, albeit with hefty shipping fees. We hope to see more roasted-at-origin offerings in the UK in the near future.

Does ethical coffee cost more?

The coffee sold by brands at the top of our score table tend to be the priciest, but this is unsurprising given that these brands are ensuring a fairer price for coffee producers and are producing coffee in more environmentally sustainable ways (which generally have lower yields).

While these more expensive coffees are affordable for some, they may not be for others. But among other high scoring brands there are a range of prices, as shown in the table below.

Coffee pods have become very popular during the past few years. Of the more ethical brands Source Climate Change's home-compostable pods are available for 65p/pod while Revolver World also sells home-compostable ones for 43p/pod.

Cafédirect

Cafédirect is the only Best Buy that is readily available in supermarkets. Three-quarters of its coffee is directly traded and over half of the farmers have shares in the business. Two of its eight board members are also farmers. Its largest shareholder, Oikocredit is a social impact investor which supports communities across Africa, Asia, and Latin America.

100% of Cafédirect’s coffee is Fairtrade International certified and 85% of its coffee is organic. Cafédirect acquired Grumpy Mule in 2023 gaining a large roasting facility in Yorkshire.

Although the ratio of its organic coffee fell to 59% following the acquisition, the company claims that two years later it rose to 85%.

Recent changes in the coffee sector

The price of raw coffee beans was emerging from a 15-year low when we published our last coffee guide in 2022. Since then, we’ve seen a general price rise, after multiple global events added layers of unpredictability and volatility into the coffee market.

The Covid-19 pandemic and the 2021 Suez Canal blockage had already disrupted the global flow of coffee before US tariffs and unfavourable weather (likely exacerbated by the climate crisis) drove further market scarcity. Commodity brokers and speculators, ever quick to sense opportunity in crisis, have since increasingly bet on continued price appreciation, resulting in a volatile market.

One might think that generally higher bean prices are good news for farmers, but the reality is more complex. Most gains flow to speculators, traders, exporters, and intermediaries who take significant cuts. Even with Arabica prices doubling throughout 2025, smallholder farmers have seen little long-term benefit as rising input costs, extreme weather, and limited access to finance eroded any gains. Protecting the most vulnerable workers in coffee supply chains remains as pertinent an issue as ever.
 

Additional research by Ruairidh Fraser.