If you are one of the mil­lions of peo­ple who drink cof­fee every morn­ing, con­sider drink­ing Green Moun­tain Cof­fee, or using one of their Keurig machines. Here’s one rea­son why.

I was walk­ing up a steep hill in 100 degree heat in North­ern Nicaragua ear­lier this month, with 25 of our social enter­prise stu­dents, as part of our senior cap­stone class. We were in the sec­ond poor­est coun­try in the West­ern Hemi­sphere, and in one of its poor­est regions, when we came upon a sign say­ing that Green Moun­tain Cof­fee, through its cor­po­rate social respon­si­bil­ity pro­gram, had sup­ported a poor small­holder farmer coop­er­a­tive with com­mu­nity investments.