Friele wins prize for social responsibility in Brazil

(Bergen, 29th August 2004) Kaffehuset Friele was, at the weekend, awarded the ECO prize for their cultural and educational centre on the Lambari coffee farm just outside the city of Pocos de Caldas in Brazil.

American Chamber of Commerce in Sao Paulo annually presents the Premio ECO (Empresa Comunidade, which means Community Company in Portuguese). Kaffehuset Friele won the culture category; other businesses in the same category were American Express and Unilever. 114 businesses competed in five different categories. The ECO award symbolises the recognition of the top company programs which benefit directly to society.

Just under a year ago, the "Friele Cultural and Educational Centre" was opened. The centre is part of an ongoing initiative for culture and education on the farm, which employs most of the inhabitants of the city of Pocos de Caldas.

- We started with a reading program and a library. Last year we decided to further this project, says Jan Gustav Andersen, C.E.O. of Kaffehuset Friele. Andersen is proud to have been awarded this prize. It was presented to Raymon Rebetez at an awards ceremony in Sao Paulo, with 400 invited guests, on Friday.

The centre is now used by 400 children and young in the surrounding area, the centre is open 13 hours a day all through the year.

- Here we give the children the opportunity for education and development, and thereby help to prevent the young moving into the streets of the big cities. The children also take the knowledge they have gained back to their parents, says Andersen.

Kaffehuset Friele's social involvement on the Lambari farm is collaboration between the organisation Utz Kapeh, which works to ensure the economic- and socially-acceptable conditions on coffee plantations and the owner of the farm Raymon Rebetez. Friele alone has spent approximately 1 million Norwegian kroner on the centre.

Brazil has always been an important country for Kaffehuset Friele. For seven generations the company has traded coffee with this country, and today Friele imports 6000 tonnes of coffee from Brazil. This makes up almost half of the total amount of coffee that annually goes into Friele's blends.

For further information: Contact C.E.O. Jan Gustav Andersen, mobile: +47 91 38 35 63.