Colombia Trip 2015 - Marie-Anne Rogers

In early February Masteroast visited our Colombian suppliers. A number of customers and guests joined us on 
the trip to Southern Huila and Quindío. 

Part 1

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Leaving the vibrant capital of Bogota, we caught a flight to Neiva the capital of Huila. Our local guide and enigmatic coffee trader Pablo made sure we negotiated out way out of the inevitable delays.

Huila is a state located in the corridor of the Andes Mountains. It is a geographically recognised coffee growing region in Colombia.  By 2016 Huila is expected to be the largest coffee producing region in Colombia. 

Our first visit was to the Association of Occiacafe, located in La Plata which boarders Cauca. Occicafe currently has over 220 members situated in the surrounding municipals. We met with the association manager Cesar Tuilo Rameriz. At the time of our visit the main harvest had finished in the region.  Southern Huila’s main harvest runs from April to October with the fly crop from October to March.

Throughout the year parchment coffee is dropped off by farmers; they receive the daily rate based on crop quality, volume and domestic prices.

During our visits a farmer dropped of 70kg parchment, Cesar confirmed once cupped and graded this lot would only make 24- 20kg of green coffee. Everyone in the group started to appreciate blending the coffee lot would be inevitable, unless the QC team felt it to be of exceptional quality. 

We moved onto Café Belen, one of the newer Association groups in La Plata. Formed in 2012 and managed by Luis Gonzaga Camero, the group currently buys directly from around 200 farmers and sometimes from other smaller Associations.  Luis estimated most of the farmers owned small holds of 3.5-5 hectares. He confirmed most would not be for subsistence farming and only use inter-cropping for partial coffee shade.

After cupping a solid selection of coffees from both groups and a hearty local lunch we headed out to the first farm.

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La Reforma Farm is a multiple certified farm, located in the Alto Coral Sector. The Ibgaon family has been farming coffee for 35 years. The farm is 1720masl and grows Caturra and the regional Castillo varietal.  Sebastian currently has 1500 mature and young Caturra trees planted, with the rest being Castillo. He confirmed the hardy Castillo provided the highest yields but as they were relatively young their life expectancy still remains unclear. 

At the time of our visit some labourers from the neighbouring department of Cacua were picking and collecting cherries. Much of the labour on the farms relies on migrants from other Colombian regions. It is always hard to put things into local perspective, but an awareness of the importance and welfare of the labour force beyond the customary photo opportunity is important.

Sebastian estimated 100kg of cherries would equate to 16kg of finished green coffee. For every 1kg of cherries picked the picker would receive 400 pesos. There is a lot of waste from cherry to seed which is rarely accounted for. Sebastian mixed his pulp with the by- products of nitrogen rich chicken waste to use as a coffee and general plant fertilizer. He also had onsite water tanks to break down the fermentation waste water.

We rounded off the visit with a cup of their tasty coffee and a classic sweeties hand out to the local kids. Needless to say the boiled sweets were a great ice and tooth breaker!

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Part 2

Next day we headed out to eastern Huila to the municipal of Guadalupe and visited the Group Association Villa Esperanza. This group has 97 members and is managed by Rodrigo Figueroa, their intentions were to grow fast. The manager’s ambitions were to increase to 156 growers in less than 2 months! Parchment had been drying on the covered roof top patios and in the patio tunnels.  The cupping session presented different regional cup profiles, bright coffees with complex acidity and lighter bodies. In all a real good comparison for the differing tastes found in the appellation regions of Southern Huila.

We headed to Timana, where we visited Association Group Asprotimana . The larger than life manager Robinson Figueroa and his exuberant team welcomed us to their main office. Though all the Association supply Masteroast with conventional and certified coffees, Asprotimana were the first ones we sourced specialist farm lots from back in 2013. One of the few Associations to have a very smart coffee shop which also doubled up as a licensed bar!

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Robinson confirmed they had sold 2.5 million Kg of parchment coffee last year.  . One of the ways they were able to support farmer members, had been through agronomists who visited farms and suggested potential improvements. Like all of the Associations we visited they had a solid team of cuppers and graders. 

From here we visited El Viso, Alvaro Perez´s farm located in Timana municipality, 11km south of Pitalito. The family home overlooked their 4 hectare farm in the valley. The partially shaded farm was self-sufficient in processing the coffee to parchment stage.

Taking the off road route to El Parasoio Farm, we visited Ovidio Ascencio farm. Ovidio runs the main seedling nursery in the region. A lot of hands, and TLC, nurture the coffee trees. Ovidio used planted the parchment into a pre-made blend of soil; these were then packed into a fitted plastic bag. It is always great to see the different stages of development.

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Part 3

After a brief stop in Bogotá to recuperate and rehydrate the group, we headed off to the department of Quindio. Nestled between Colombia’s three largest cities Medellin, Bogota and Calia. Though a lot less dramatic than Huila, the rolling hills, lush long grasses and tropical climate appealed. The department’s main economy is still coffee and bananas. 

We drove to Trujillo (Valle del Cauca department) and visited one of the top 10 biggest coffee farms in Colombia, called La Rochela. Owned by Carlos Arturo Duque the coffee and avocado farms were spread across 300 hectares. The main varietals found on the farm include Caturra, Castillio and Colombia. Alongside these different plots were allocated to Pacamara, Geisha, Moka and other experimental Federation varietals.

Carlos explained the Caturra can last for up to 30 years before it is cut back. In comparison the Pacamara is cut back after 6 years. He put the average volume of different varietals into perspective. . The Castillo plant produced an average of 6200kg cherries per hectare whilst Caturra on average produces 5000 hectares, in complete contrast Pacamara produced 300kg per hectare. Even though the Pacarmara, Moka and Geisha sell at significant premiums they require greater maintenance and are still a risk for Carlos.

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Their wet mill had state of the art processing and drying equipment. Carlos explained they experiment with fermentation time and pulping. Their latest piece of equipment was a layered parchment air dryer. The aim of parchment drying is to achieve homogenous drying and not to under or over dry. I had never seen a dryer where the parchment coffees are placed in different compartments, with the hot air flowing from the bottom. Carlos still used African beds for drying and turning specialist varietals. At the time of our visit Moka and Pacamara were drying side by side. Heading back on the road we visited the main drying mill of our exporter. Run by mill manager Joachim Kuhrt, they store both parchment and green beans. The process of cleaning sorting, grading, packing and cupping ensures the export grades; volumes and cup qualities are achieved. The final destination for the green coffee is the Caribbean port of Cartagena. The FNC validate the grades and screen sizes, if all is well it should be with us about 5 weeks later

Colombia trip Gallery