Empowering Women & Improving Coffee at JUMARP

In this blog, we wanted to share one of our long lasting and mutually beneficial partnerships with a cooperative in Peru. The Asociación de Productores Cafetaleros Juan Marco “El Palto” (JUMARP) was founded by José Carranza Barboza in partnership with 35 other smallholder farmers, in 2003. They created the association out of a desire to develop a new model of growing and exporting coffee. 

Lasting Relationships... 

Every year, we commit to buying several containers from JUMARP. We believe in the mission of the cooperative and want to support them in the fantastic work they are doing to not only increase coffee quality and organic farming practices, but also to strengthen gender equality in their communities. We are committed to buying JUMARP’s coffees through thick and thin, even when harvests are difficult. As a result, JUMARP members are able to depend on a certain level of income from their coffee year in and year out, ensuring the longevity of their coffee quality and community improvement projects with dependable funds. 

All 188 members produce coffee certified as organic and Fairtrade. The cooperative invests the premiums received from these certifications in a number of important community projects including crop renovations, a fund for education programs and the construction of schools.  

...Lead to Great Coffee 

One of their programs is the ambitious quality improvement program, which launched in 2012. Funded by Fairtrade and Organic premiums as well as government funding and member contributions, the program aims to raise general overall cup score to 85-86 by 2021. They’ve already taken tangible steps towards this goal and we’ve seen improvement in coffees since the initiation of the program. They built drying houses, manual pulpers and fermentation tanks at all member farms and planted higher quality varietals to address coffee quality at all stages of the production process from seed to cup.  

New Opportunities for Female Producers  

Another program we wanted to highlight is the Mujeres program. Mujeres—Spanish for women—seeks to improve social and economic standing for women members. The cooperative noticed that women were typically only involved in the cooperative peripherally, especially when it came to decision making. To increase women’s participation, they identified barriers to women’s active participation and then began implementing steps to get women more involved. The Mujeres program helps women develop their knowledge and skills of leadership, self-esteem, decision making, entrepreneur management and teamwork. The participants also receive sensory training and learn to roast in order to help them sell their coffee at a local market.  

In fact, the project has been so successful that we’ve been invited to purchase two lots directly from female producers in Mujeres program. These coffees, which are slated to arrive in early December, are an exciting and cutting-edge development from JUMARP.  

Very few women who farm coffee are able to sell micro-lots under their names. This is typically due to a number of compounding factors including (but not limited to): land ownership rights in producing countries, gender inequality and an imbalance of power between farmers—especially female ones—and purchasers. With the help of JUMARP and their Mujeres program, Floremilda Baca Ramirez and Dolores Concepcion Sialot Arvalo have overcome the multiplicity of barriers making women’s names on micro-lots so rare and produced, processed and sold their micro-lots under their own names. 

We hope you’ll help us continue to support JUMARP’s great work by purchasing Floremilda and Dolores’ micro-lots as well as some of the larger lots we have available. Cupping notes for the women’s lots will be available soon after the coffees arrive at port in early December. Please contact us today to talk about how these coffees can fit into your coffee program.