About This Coffee
The family behind Fazenda São Bento acquired the land in 1925 and spent their first decades raising dairy cattle for milk production. The family first planted coffee in 1984, starting with only 10 hectares. As their interest in specialty coffee grew, they slowly expanded the area under coffee. Today, coffee covers almost 80 hectares of the farm’s total 300 hectares, and the third generation of the family is in charge of production under José Eduardo Menezes de Mendonça.
The family is an active member of Carmocer cooperative. As climate change continues to bring new (and more severe) pressures every season, the cooperative’s support has been critical in helping them to adapt and improve rather than accepting lower yields.
Cultivation
The farm sits at 1,110 metres above sea level in the municipality of Carmo do Paranaíba, part of the Cerrado region of Minas Gerais. Arara is the main variety on the farm. It is grown alongside Yellow Catuaí 62, Red Catuaí 144 and Acauã. The family has moved toward newer varieties chosen for disease resistance and productivity, with the aim of keeping quality steady from one harvest to the next.
Harvest & Post-Harvest
José Eduardo and his team harvest their coffee mechanically. After harvest, the cherries are laid out on patios to dry and are raked regularly to ensure even drying. Depending on weather conditions, cherry may be moved to mechanical slow dryers to finish drying at low temperatures.
About Arara
Arara is a newer variety from Brazil that’s prized for its high-scoring cup profile combined with resilience and productivity. The variety is a cross between Yellow Catuai and Obatã, which is itself a Timor hybrid. It grows as a yellow fruit with large-sized beans. The variety has high resistance to Coffee Leaf Rust (CLR), good productivity, high quality potential and compact trees that make it easier to harvest. Since its release, competitions have seen this coffee top out at low 90s cup scores.
NY2
NY2 is a designation that assures us that there are no more than 6 visible defects in a 300-gram sample. This small number of defects is unnoticeable in most cups, ensuring a consistent and delicious flavor.
About Carmocer
Carmocer is a coffee cooperative based in Carmo do Paranaíba, in Brazil’s Cerrado Mineiro region. Its full name, Cooperativa dos Cafeicultores do Cerrado da Região de Carmo do Paranaíba, sums it up: a cooperative built by and for Cerrado coffee growers.
Founded in 2001, Carmocer today serves around 70 members, ranging from medium-sized farms (10–100 hectares) to large producers (100+ hectares). Together they produce an average of 250,000 to 300,000 bags a year.
Members farm across Serra do Salitre, Rio Paranaíba, Campos Altos, São Gotardo, Lagoa Formosa, Patos de Minas, Presidente Olegário, João Pinheiro and Diamantina, at altitudes between 950 and 1,220 meters above sea level. They grow a wide range of varieties, including Red Catuaí 144, Yellow Catuaí 62, Mundo Novo, Bourbon, Arara and Topázio. Productivity here sits well above Brazil’s national average, thanks to strong production techniques and a highly trained, professional farming community.
Carmocer also invests in the future of Cerrado coffee. The cooperative maintains 10 experimental lots on farms across the region, testing how different coffee cultivars perform. This information is used to keep farmer members up to date and to provide the most accurate information on varieties that perform well in the region.
In addition to these services, Carmocer provides storage and warehousing for members, along with professional coffee quality analysis and classification. The cooperative also offers commercial guidance and hosts regional competitions that reward quality. It organizes the Etapa Campeões Carmocer, the local round of the well-known Cerrado Mineiro Prêmio Região, and serves as an official collection point for other specialty coffee competitions, including Florada Premiada, which recognizes female coffee producers in Brazil.
Additionally, the cooperative is deeply invested in the wellbeing of the wider community. Since 2021, Carmocer and its members have supported Vila Vicentina, a local nursing home, through donations and funds from coffee production. The cooperative also joins other local cooperatives for the city’s Cooperation Day, which includes food drives, health screenings and donations to the Cancer Hospital of Patrocínio.
Coffee in Brazil
Just under 40% of all coffee in the world is produced in Brazil - around 3.7 million metric tons annually. With so much coffee produced, it’s no wonder that the country produces a wide range of qualities. Brazil produces everything from natural Robusta, to the neutral and mild Santos screen 17/18, to the distinctive Rio Minas 17/18. In recent years, Brazilian producers have also begun investing more heavily in specialty coffee production. Through our in-country partners in Brazil, including our sister company, we are able to provide a wide range of Brazilian coffees to our clients: from macrolot to microlot.
Today, the most prolific coffee growing regions of Brazil are Espirito Santo, São Paulo, Minas Gerais, and Bahia. Most Brazilian coffee is grown on large farms that are built and equipped for maximizing production output through mechanical harvesting and processing. The relatively flat landscape across many of Brazil’s coffee regions combined with high minimum wages has led most farms to opt for this type of mechanical harvesting over selective hand-picking.
In the past, mechanization meant that strip-picking was the norm; however, today’s mechanical harvesters are increasingly sensitive, meaning that farms can harvest only fully ripe cherries at each pass, which is good news for specialty-oriented producers.
In many cases and on less level sections of farms, a mixed form of ‘manual mechanized’ harvesting may be used, where ripe coffee is picked using a derriçadeira – a sort of mechanized rake that uses vibration to harvest ripe cherry. A tarp is spanned between coffee trees to capture the cherry as it falls.
With the aid of these newer, more selective technologies, there’s a growing number of farms who are increasingly concerned with – and able to deliver - cup quality.