Community Initiatives and Local Networks among K’ho Cil Smallholder Coffee Farmers in the Central Highlands of Vietnam: A Case Study

Over the last two decades, coffee growers in Vietnam have faced the same problems as farmers all over the world. Ethnographic research among the community of K’ho Cil coffee growers in Lam Dong Province from 2016 to 2018 documented local initiatives to deal with the problems through the establishment of a K’ho Coffee network, revitalization of traditional production patterns, local integration into the global coffee commodity chain and agritourism entrepreneurship. Conceptualizing the way local K’ho Coffee growers generated and implemented the initiatives, this paper argues that by utilizing their social network, local farmers revitalized their economic production. Negotiating a decent collective position in the world system of the coffee commodity chain offers them a chance to survive the influx of economic deregulation and avert the impacts of climate change.