#coffeefarms

I was out of Bogota early, taking a quick 40-minute flight to a town called Pereira. I got off the plane and walked out of the baggage pick up where I immediately bumped into a classmate. I was in the right place.

An hour later, 18 of us had formed while we waited for a bus to pick us up and take us into Manizales. Manizales, coupled with Pereira and Armenia, make up the coffee triangle and center of Colombian coffee farms. 

The bus dropped us off at the top of a mountain and we hiked four miles down to the riverbed at the bottom, passing rows and rows of coffee plants, bubbling streams, and farmers’ homes. 

We arrived at the bottom to a small inn called Hacienda Venecia. Upon arrival we were served a bandeja paisa for lunch, which included rice, bean soup, meat, arepa, avocado, and maduros. After that we had a coffee tasting and informational session, where we were also taken out to parts of the farm and shown the different types of arabica plants that produce the coffee beans exported out of Colombia. 

After some free time hanging in a hammack and watching an afternoon storm roll through the mountains, we had a BBQ dinner with beef, chicken, patacones, potatoes, and salad. We also learned from the women that work here how to make patacones (flattened platano fried “pancakes”).  

Coffee Farms

My road trips do actually revolve around coffee. No detour is ever a problem if I know there is a decent cupper in it for me...

So the Blawen Guesthouse was nice but I forgot that Indonesia is predominately a muslim country, It was a little bit of a  shock when I was awoken at 03:30 by the call to prayer. I did take the opportunity to take a little stroll round the estate and watch the sun come up on the surrounding mountains, so peaceful & beautiful.

After another fantastic Indonesian breakfast, we had the absolute pleasure of visiting the Balawan Coffee plantation mill. This is a huge government owned and operated coffee farm. With 4000 hectres of perfectly conditioned coffee tress this was a real treat. We started with a tour of the drying patios. Huge areas of concrete with about 4 cm deep worth of coffee drying on them. These are left for approx 2 - 3 weeks until they have reached the required moisture content, roughly 13% of moisture.

It was amazing to see the drying process in action, watching the farmers carefully turn and agitate all the beans to ensure they don’t spoil was fantastic. We then went into the factory to see all the processes that need to happen before the drying can take place. I had a good knowledge of how coffee was processed but to see it in the flesh, again was brilliant. I won’t go into detail into the whole process but if you do want to know then please drop me a line. We start with the coffee pulper

Then we move onto the fermentation/washing tanks, they also go through a second wash as the beans get put through the trough below. This gives the beans a second wash but also helps sort out any defects

The now clean beans need be dried so off they head to the drying patios. Once the beans are dried, they are put through the mill to remove the parchment that is still on the bean. They then go through a mechanical gravity sorter. This shakes the beans though various holes to determine the screen size

Seeing all this truly was incredible.

Next stop is the coffee fields. At approx 1254 meters above sea level

I saw, in the flesh my first coffee tree & cherry.

We then teamed up with one of the local ladies who do the picking and also met  a wonderfully nice lady who like to be called Bee.

It was great to see and experience picking the cherries with a true pro. I found the whole experience of being in the field quite moving, It’s something that I have wanted to do for some time and now, here I am, experiencing it! Privileged is a understatement. What a morning, some amazing coffees, beautiful surroundings, a day I will not forget for a long long time. Back on the bus and then a short drive back to Ljen Mountains to see one of the farms that belong to the Ljen Estate we visited on Thursday. Unexpectedly we arrived to find the Bupati had organised a huge town party in our honour. The police, army and all the locals from the surroundings villages were there. Everybody wanted a selfie with us, including the local army division, it was crazy but fantastic at the same time.

We were ushered through the crowds so quickly that I didn’t get chance to speak to any of the crowd which was a shame but the atmosphere of the whole event was electric. We had a walk into the plantation and saw some beautifully maintained trees as well as some really ripe cherries.

Again It was really beautiful seeing all the greens and reds of the plants, I was in heaven. At this point, I was asked by the local TV crew to do a small Interview whilst walking through the plantation talking about my thoughts on Bondowoso coffee, I was of course, very complimentary and we a good chuckle #localcelebrity

After I spent a little time, wandering around the coffee plants, taking in the whole experience we were again presented with a wonderful spread of the local food & fruits for our lunch. The hospitality and welcome we received from everybody here, from the Bupati, the farmers, the pickers and security are second to none.

We talked with Thomas Haigh, the head of coffee and roaster at Tate about one of their awesome projects.

TATE 50/50 Gender Equality Project

Our 50/50 Gender Equality Project is a sourcing and roasting approach that aims to recognise both male and female producers on a 50/50 basis by working with and sourcing coffee from male and female farmers throughout our coffee range. The project started a couple of months after I started at Tate, earlier this year; I’ve always been curious as to the lack of female representation of producers on the cupping table and have always wanted to investigate the potential to widen the awareness of female involvement over at origin and balancing out the representation of gender within the market. Tate’s vision, that is the philosophy we run our institution by, holds equality at its heart – not only as a foundation for accessibility of art to the general public but in its staffing and internal ethos. Introducing the Gender Equality Project within our coffee sourcing protocols enables us to realise our stance on equality right through to the acquisition of our products and relationships with producers.

Aims and dreams.

The primary goals of this project is to address the imbalance of female representation within the coffee market, acknowledging male and female coffee producers equally in how we source and develop our annual range of coffees for Tate. We want to develop our house espresso and single origin range with this philosophy at its core and continually investigate the role of women over at origin, developing lasting relationships with the producers we meet along the way. Our aim is to create a repeatable range of seasonal coffees for Tate that showcases the talents and flavour profiles of female and male producers in specific origins, recognising and supporting families and independent farmers as best we can.

The process so far

So far we’ve worked with coffee from female producers, co-operatives and washing station owners in Kenya, Honduras, Colombia and Guatemala; we’ve discovered that, with a little more attention and focus, it’s accessible and achievable to source amazing coffees grown by female producers continually throughout the year. It’s given our range more direction and has created a backbone in how we look for and source our coffees. That being said, however, we have come to realise that addressing gender equality is often origin-specific and has potential political, social and cultural sensitivities to consider; each origin is vastly complex and has deep-rooted traditions that structure the role of women in the producing environment. I’ve come to realise that, often, it isn’t that women producers aren’t being well represented in the consuming market, it’s that they aren’t being recognised over at origin – as is the case with many producers, coffee farms are managed and run by the whole family and, as the husband usually owns the farm, it’s marketed under his name. This has made us re-evaluate our approach in sourcing coffees and has initiated further investigations into gender equality directing us to not only look at female producers but family producers, researching the traditional roles of the wife and husband at specific origins

Relationships and ethos

This project currently takes shape within our single origin range; due to the smaller volumes and frequent rotation of our singles we haven’t yet had the opportunity to visit these producers, but have been tasting and researching coffees through a collective of importers who are helping us connect with women at the origin. Next year I hope to visit the majority of producers we have been working with the build on a long-term relationship.

I have, however, been over to origin recently to source components for our Gallery Espresso (our house blend) for next year and research our aspirations with this project some more. I spend a week in Brazil and Colombia visiting female, male and family producers to create a new espresso profile that is harmonious both in flavour, but also gender representation. In Brazil I am continuing our relationship with the APROD group in Divinolandia, who we’ve been working with for the past year, and am introducing coffees from two female producers; Leda Castellane Pereira Lima and Cristiane Aparecido Olimpio. We’ll be showcasing these three producers on 2-monthly cycles in our blend, pairing them with two specific family-produced, regional lots from Andino and Quebradon in Colombia. Colombia has much smaller farmsteads so, to create the volume that we require for our espresso, we’ve brought specific Family-focused producers together from these regions to create a flavour profile and a backstory that demonstrates the quality and ethos that we’re all about.

Early next year I’m hoping to continue our investigations at the origin in the search of more gender-focused project for our single origins and espresso for late ’17.

Who does the project benefit and how?

I feel that our project is accessible and has many benefits within it; not only are we attempting to support female and male producers directly over at origin, but we’re also focusing on the family environment too, speaking for the whole family, and not just the husband, when looking into sourcing our coffee. All producers and importers that I’ve met during our journey so far have been really receptive to our aspirations; not only can we focus on the financial benefits for the producers we work with, but we hope to instigate a broader conversation as to the role of both women and men in the industry, at origin and in consuming countries. I hope this will instigate a change in the way we approach gender in Specialty Coffee and create a platform in which we can speak about the accessibility of the industry to both men and women.

Women in coffee