Does Ali set standards for Yunnan coffee？ Yunnan Coffee Association issued a statement in response.
According to the Yunnan Information Daily reported on January 5th, that evening, Yunnan Coffee Industry Association (hereinafter referred to as Yunnan Coffee Association) issued a statement to the media, saying that there was no case that Ali made standards for Yunnan coffee, but the news released by the media meeting held by the association on the afternoon of December 31st, 2020 was a misunderstanding caused by information errors in communication between the two parties, and there was no case that Ali joined hands with other enterprises to suppress Yunnan coffee.
The relevant statement also stated that the Yunnan Coffee Industry Association and Ali reached a consensus of "initial agreement" through urgent communication, all in order to help Yunnan coffee develop better and faster, provide consumers with a healthier cup of good coffee, and better drive coffee farmers to increase their income and get rich, and inform the media accordingly.
According to an earlier report by China News Network, on December 31st, 2020, Yunnan Coffee Association held a press conference, expressing dissatisfaction with "Alibaba drafting industry initiatives instead of Yunnan Coffee Association". This incident has aroused public concern.
At the meeting, Li Gongqin, secretary general of the association, introduced that on December 2, 2020, a conference on the development of coffee industry was held in Kunming, Yunnan. At that time, representatives from Nestle, Alibaba, Nestle Agronomy Service Department and some Yunnan coffee enterprises attended the meeting. After the meeting, Alibaba sent a letter to Yunnan Coffee Industry Association, and drafted the "Proposal on Standardizing and Improving the Quality of Three-in-One Instant Coffee Produced in Yunnan" on behalf of Yunnan Coffee Industry Association, and asked the association to reply with its seal.
Li Gongqin said that the association disagreed with the contents of the letter, and some contents were seriously inconsistent with the facts. The association had answered Alibaba in five aspects and was "puzzled" by Alibaba’s move.
Subsequently, this matter caused public concern on social networks.
The reporter learned that at the meeting on December 2, the representative of Yunnan Zhongfei Food Co., Ltd., a coffee company in Yunnan, also attended the meeting. The company’s delegates were surprised that Ali was suddenly questioned by the coffee industry association. The reporter called the company’s delegates. He said, "The agricultural department officials and business representatives were on the scene that day. During the meeting, in order to further standardize and promote the healthy development of the coffee industry, Yunnan Coffee Association took the initiative to ask Ali to draft a proposal. "
It is understood that the initiative drafted by Alibaba is the "Initiative on Standardizing and Improving the Quality of Three-in-One Instant Coffee Produced in Yunnan". At present, neither Yunnan Coffee Association nor Alibaba has announced the specific content of the initiative. Just from the title of the initiative, standardizing and improving the quality is a general requirement of the state for each industry.
On January 5th, the relevant person of Yunnan Agriculture Department, the competent department of Yunnan Coffee Association, also said in an interview with Red Star Capital Bureau, "After a preliminary understanding, the information that has been circulated on the Internet has been found to be untrue."
The interviewee revealed that the meeting will continue on January 5, and when things have a clear context, the official who should speak will naturally speak.
China News Network quoted people in the industry as saying that it is proper for trade associations to absorb and accept opinions from all sides in the process of formulating industry standards. Alibaba, as an e-commerce platform, has nothing wrong with proposing to improve the quality of the coffee industry.
Attached:
China trillion coffee consumption potential market situation.
Domestic coffee organization initiative: Chinese people should be alert and self-reliant
—— Reply on Alibaba’s drafting of an initiative letter for Yunnan Coffee Industry Association.
Background: On December 2, 2020, a meeting on the development of coffee industry was held in Kunming, Yunnan, with representatives of Nestle, Alibaba, Nestle Agronomy Service Department and some coffee enterprises in Yunnan participating in the meeting.
After the meeting, Alibaba sent a letter to Yunnan Coffee Industry Association, and drafted the "Proposal on Standardizing and Improving the Quality of Three-in-One Instant Coffee Produced in Yunnan" for Yunnan Coffee Industry Association, and asked the association to reply after sealing it. However, the content of this proposal is seriously inconsistent with the real situation of Yunnan Coffee Industry, and Yunnan Coffee Industry Association hereby officially publicly replied to Alibaba:
First, the content of the initiative is seriously inconsistent with the real situation of Yunnan coffee industry. Alibaba drafted the "Proposal on Standardizing and Improving the Quality of Three-in-One Instant Coffee Produced in Yunnan" for Yunnan Coffee Industry Association. Yunnan Coffee Industry Association thanked Alibaba for its concern, and proposed in the proposal that "Yunnan Coffee Industry Association member enterprises should improve the processing standards of three-in-one instant coffee products and improve the quality level of products". Then please ask Alibaba to clearly state first what is the problem with the quality of three-in-one instant coffee produced in Yunnan. Is it sugar? Is it coffee? Is it non-dairy creamer? Or something else?
Second, what purpose should the proposal achieve? Alibaba drafted a proposal for Yunnan Coffee Industry Association and asked Yunnan Coffee Industry Association to seal it and issue it to its member units. If you invite the association to work out coffee standards together, Yunnan promulgated local standards for instant coffee four years ago. If you want to propose to improve the quality of coffee products in Yunnan, please tell the association which country has violated the regulations or standards promulgated by Yunnan Coffee? We are puzzled, and even think that this initiative put forward by Alibaba is not necessarily your original intention.
If it’s Alibaba’s suggestion, although you are well-intentioned, do you know the consequences of the association issuing a stamp to you without proof that Yunnan three-in-one coffee does not meet any national standards? Just on December 22nd, the State Administration of Market Supervision and the Ministry of Commerce issued a notice, which clearly stipulated "Nine No’s". If it was stamped, the association would be suspected of participating in violating Article 5 of the notice: "No unfair competition behaviors such as commercial confusion, false propaganda, commercial slander, etc., endangering the fair competition market environment". If I don’t stamp it on you, I’m also worried that someone will go to the relevant department to report the association’s inaction and not cooperate with the "spirit of the meeting" that day!
In fact, there was no information at the meeting that day to prove that Yunnan’s three-in-one coffee violated the national standards. On the contrary, all the indicators of Yunnan’s three-in-one coffee met the current national standards. After the meeting, the Association also communicated with the relevant participating departments and enterprises. Indeed, not only was it not found that Yunnan coffee violated any national standards, but all the three-in-one coffees produced in all provinces of China were produced in accordance with the current national solid beverage standards. You are also welcome to continue to supervise, and our Association will never shirk its responsibilities.
If this proposal is not mainly put forward by Alibaba, who else? Why is China’s coffee industry just getting better, and it has been criticized and hit so quickly? In fact, Alibaba may also be the victim, because you are not a real coffee company, why do you want to ask us to do the so-called standard improvement? Despite your good intentions, the association must also safeguard the fairness and justice of the industry. Afterwards, in order to be prudent, the Association further consulted the China Coffee Engineering Research Center, the Secretariat of the Asian Coffee Association and the Coffee and Cocoa Professional Committee of the China-Africa General Chamber of Commerce, and agreed that most of the three-in-one coffee standards, not only in Yunnan and China, but also in Asia and the world, were formulated by international coffee giants, including the national standard for solid drinks in People’s Republic of China (PRC), and three foreign-funded enterprises also participated in the formulation!
Third, what criteria are used to measure the proposal? Three-in-one coffee is an inevitable category of coffee consumption in any country in the world. When the three-in-one coffee products produced by Yunnan coffee enterprises are legal and compliant, it is dangerous to receive a letter from Alibaba and put forward an initiative to Yunnan coffee enterprises, which is conducive to the possibility that a small number of "international-level" coffee multinational enterprises monopolize the Chinese coffee market.
Fourth, is the purpose of the proposal to revise the national standards? The national standard for solid drinks issued in 2013, because there were few enterprises making solid drinks in China at that time, so several foreign-funded enterprises were invited to participate in the formulation of the standard for solid drinks at that time, and we understand. But now, China’s solid beverage enterprises and coffee enterprises have developed. Please forgive us for not being able to cooperate and accept that several foreign-funded enterprises are responsible for "overall planning and initiation" and then formulate or revise any national standards in People’s Republic of China (PRC)!
Fifth, it is suggested that China enterprises draft national standards. Yunnan Coffee Industry Association, China Coffee Engineering Research Center, Hainan Coffee Industry Association, Shandong Coffee Chamber of Commerce, Chongqing Coffee Industry Association and other industry organizations jointly stated: It is recommended that the state redraft the People’s Republic of China (PRC) Solid Beverage Standard; The original standards for solid drinks (three-in-one coffee) were jointly drafted by Nestle in Switzerland, Kraft in the United States, Unilever and other enterprises, and domestic coffee industry organizations said that they could no longer understand and accept them. If it is necessary to embody the principle of cultural inclusion, foreign enterprises can only serve as advisory units of the standard-setting Committee at most.
One more question: Can any country accept our China enterprises to participate in the formulation of any standards in their country? Why can we in China be open to foreign-funded enterprises to develop freely in China, but foreign-funded enterprises can’t tolerate our development in our own country?
The person in charge of Yunnan coffee industry hopes that foreign-funded enterprises and our enterprises in China can seek common ground while reserving differences, tolerate each other and develop together to form a pattern of fair competition.
Under the background of "Six Guarantees, Six Guarantees and Economic Double Cycle", the fair competition environment in the domestic coffee consumption market is very important for the healthy development of millions of coffee farmers in Yunnan and China’s coffee industry. I hope Alibaba won’t take the lead, because it may touch the danger that the Chinese coffee industry will be monopolized again!
According to the incomplete statistics of Yunnan Coffee Industry Association, Yunnan coffee has been sold cheaply for 30 years due to the influence of foreign coffee companies’ pricing! Compared with the international equivalent products, the income per ton of coffee beans is reduced by at least 3,000 yuan, and it is an indisputable fact that Yunnan coffee farmers have lost at least 10 billion yuan over the past 30 years.
Finally, domestic coffee organizations propose that Chinese people should be alert and self-reliant in the face of the domestic trillion-dollar coffee consumption potential market!
Source: Observer Network Fengwen community is integrated from Yunnan Information News, China News Network, Red Star Capital Bureau, etc.
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