About This Coffee
Finca La Providencia is located in the San Pedro Necta area of the Huehuetenango department. The farm extends over 96 hectares between the altitude range from 1,300 to 1,600 meters above sea level. The farm is mainly planted with Caturra and Catuai and also a small patch of Pacamara.
Harvest & Post-Harvest
Victor Hugo Anzueto runs a tight ship on his farm when it comes down to quality. During our visit in February, we arrived right at the time when the day’s harvest was being carried into the reception point at the wet mill. The farm employs up to 120 skilled pickers to select only the ripe cherry for specialty coffee production. The overseer at the intake checks every bag before it is dumped into the cherry hopper. If unripe cherries show up, the bag is not processed until the picker has sorted it more thoroughly.
Ripe cherry is pulped on the farm's Penagos pulper. Their Penagos is an eco-pulper that preserves water. Whereas the typical washed process involves fermentation and extensive washing to remove all mucilage, the Penagos pulper can remove most of the mucilage by friction, reducing water usage by up to 95%.
After pulping, cherry is washed in clean water - a fraction of the total water usage in traditional Fully washed processing - and then laid in thin layers on the farm's patios to sundry. After two days, parchment is transferred to a mechnical dry to finish drying to the ideal moisture content.
Coffee in Guatemala
Guatemala boasts a variety of growing regions and conditions that produce spectacular coffees. Today, the country is revered as a producer of some of the most flavorful and nuanced cups worldwide. We are proud to work with several exceptional in-country partners to bring these coffees to market.
The Guatemalan coffee industry experienced a major setback with the 2010 appearance of Coffee Leaf Rust (CLR) in Latin America. The epidemic peaked in severity in 2012, and though CLR continues to affect some farms, Guatemala continues to produce high-quality, record-breaking coffees. In 2017, new and varied processing methods pushed prices at the Guatemalan Cup of Excellence contest to record highs.
The quality of coffee being produced in Guatemala is increasing, overall, due to the diversity of the industry’s producers. There are more and more small holder farmers producing exceptional coffee at high altitudes. Cooperatives are becoming more appealing to so many smallholders because they often offer farmers financing and other support for improving their farming and processing and are frequently able to offer higher prices for cherry than middlemen. Many cooperatives have initiated quality improvement training for farmer members and are becoming more adept at helping members market their coffee as specialty.