Meet David Griswold: 2023 Sustainability Award Winner, Individual Category

David Griswold has three decades of experience in the fields of specialty coffee and supply chain sustainability. David founded Sustainable Harvest in 1997 to provide smallholders and roasters with the most transparent buyer-seller connections to build a more sustainable approach to the coffee business.

Since 2004, the Specialty Coffee Association (SCA) has been proud to recognize outstanding work in the field of sustainability with its annual Sustainability Awards, giving thanks to extraordinary individuals, businesses, and organizations that have created projects or business models shown to expand and promote sustainability within the coffee world. The Individual category award celebrates individuals who have significantly contributed to advancing sustainability in the coffee industry, for example by raising awareness of key issues or developing a project or business model that generates positive social and environmental impacts.

One of the two 2023 Sustainability Award Individual Model Category winners is David Griswold.
For the individual category the judging panel, composed of 11 former SCA Sustainability Awards winners, scored two finalists with the same aggregated score. These winners, represent distant visions and trajectories, linked by their commitment to create a thriving coffee sector. For that reason, the SCA has awarded this year's individual recognition to both. The Second 2023 Sustainability Award Individual Category Winner is José Rivera. Meet José Rivera Here.

David is the CEO and Founder of Sustainable Harvest Coffee Importers.

SCA Sustainability Director, Andrés Montenegro, asked David a series of questions about this achievement, and the future of sustainability in coffee.

Here’s what he said:

What does it mean to you to win this award?

It means a great deal to be recognized for these years of hard work to reimagine a coffee industry that could be more equitable, specialty, and relationship-based. There are many deserving people to be recognized for their work in sustainability, and I am grateful for my coffee and business mentors, my staff over the years, and the coffee producer leaders who helped me shape my views and approach to sustainable coffee. I'm also grateful to my family, who supported the family business in countless ways.

How is sustainability different now than it was when you began working in the coffee industry?

Much of the sustainability landscape is different from when I began three decades ago, but much is the same. It's surprising so little progress has been made to bring a more fair economy to the coffee producers, and frustrating because we need to share our coffee profits more equitably.   It's sad to see that we still use a commodity pricing tool to set the price of a specialty, relationship-based product.  What is different from when I first began working in the coffee industry is the advances of climate change.   It was something rarely discussed when I began in coffee, and we never thought of the danger that climate change posed to agriculture. I hope that this shared challenge helps us begin to work in a more transparent and collaborative fashion with other businesses and stakeholders.  

How do you hope to see the coffee industry continue to evolve in pursuit of sustainability to #makecoffeebetter for all?

We can continue to solve our most challenging problems more effectively through a willingness to sit and have open and transparent conversations with all the key stakeholders at the table. I hope that we all learn to listen more. We should start by listening more to the people who are growing the coffee;  listening more to women throughout the industry; listening to the younger generation, who is inheriting a system that has skewed in favor of elites.  Being open to authentic business conversations about the shared challenges we have is the best place to start to make coffee better for all.

About The Sustainability Awards

The selection process for the 2023 Sustainability Awards was led by a committee of staff and volunteers, including previous SCA Sustainability Award winners. Learn more about the Sustainability Awards, including this year’s Project Category and Business Model Category award winners, as well as previous winners here.

The 2023 Sustainability Awards are generously supported by TricorBraun Flex.