About This Coffee
Orlando Jimenez and Artemisa García Huaman, alongside their children, Leiser Esmit and Darwin Yoser, are specialty-oriented coffee producers who carefully cultivate Finca El Cedro using Organic certified practices. They were early adopters of specialty practices, focusing on micro lot separation and meticulous post-harvest processes to ensure exceptional quality.
Cultivation
Situated in a region renowned for high-quality coffee production, Finca El Cedro benefits from favorable environmental conditions which are made the most of through Organic Certified cultivation methods. Orlando and Artemisa prioritize organic and environmentally friendly methods to enhance the quality of their coffee and protect the ecosystem.
Harvest & Post-Harvest
Orlando emphasizes quality-oriented practices, including careful lot separation and post-harvest processes designed to enhance flavor and consistency. Coffee is selectively handpicked and then, on the same day, delivered to Finca El Cedro’s pulping station to be dry-pulped and fermented in tile-lined tanks. After fermentation, the coffee is washed in clean water and then taken to dry in a solar hoop house on raised beds. In the controlled environment of the hoop house, it is regularly raked to ensure even drying and, thus, preservation of quality.
About Bourbon
Bourbon is a specialty coffee darling known for its excellent cup quality and good performance at high altitudes. The variety is susceptible to the major diseases, which can make it difficult to grow. Bourbon traces its heritage back to Yemen. French missionaries introduced Bourbon from Yemen to Bourbon Island (now known as La Reunion) in the early 1700s. Bourbon takes its name from the island where it prospered. Bourbon has had a huge effect on modern coffee varieties as one of the major ascensions for many varieties grown across the world. Today, Bourbon is available in both yellow and red varieties.
Coffee in Peru
Peru holds exceptional promise as a producer of high-quality coffees. The country is the largest exporter of organic Arabica coffee globally. With extremely high altitudes and fertile soils, the country’s smallholder farmers also produce some stunning specialty coffees.
Though coffee arrived in Peru in the 1700s, very little coffee was exported until the late 1800s. Until that point, most coffee produced in Peru was consumed locally. When coffee leaf rust hit Indonesia in the late 1800s, a country central to European coffee imports at the time, Europeans began searching elsewhere for their fix. Peru was a perfect option.
Between the late 1800s and the first World War, European interests invested significant resources into coffee production in Peru. However, with the advent of the two World Wars, England and other European powers became weakened and took a less colonialist perspective. When the British and other European land owners left, their land was purchased by the government and redistributed to locals. The Peruvian government repurchased the 2 million hectares previously granted to England and distributed the lands to thousands of local farmers. Many of these farmers later grew coffee on the lands they received.
Today, Peruvian coffee growers are overwhelmingly small scale. Farmers in Peru usually process their coffee on their own farms. Most coffee is Fully washed. Cherry is usually pulped, fermented and dried in the sun on raised beds or drying sheds. Drying greenhouses and parabolic beds are becoming more common as farmers pivot towards specialty markets.
After drying, coffee will then be sold in parchment to the cooperative. Producers who are not members of a cooperative will usually sell to a middleman.
The remoteness of farms combined with their small size means that producers need either middlemen or cooperatives to help get their coffee to market. Cooperative membership protects farmers greatly from exploitation and can make a huge difference to income from coffee. Nonetheless, currently only around 15-25% of smallholder farmers have joined a coop group.