Coffee Harvest

By Matt

At this time of year many people have migrated up to the mountains of Honduras to pick coffee. We see pickup trucks and mules coming down out of the mountians with big sacks of coffee on them. Coffee is one of my favorite crops not only because I love to drink it, but because I have seen the positive impacts it can have on God's creation and for the people here in Honduras (when its done right).

In the Ag/Environment program we are working with a group of producers from El Carrizal with the goal of exporting coffee to Canada. This is no small task! But I really love the challenge, and the farmers are very excited about it too. The Carpinteros have been instrumental in this initiative since they know the producers well and have a desire to see them get a price that is in accordance with the quality of coffee they produce. This year is more of a trial than anything with the amount of coffee small enough so that the risk is low enough both for the farmers and the buyers. One thing is for sure, Olancho has some amazing terrain for coffee growing. Up in the mountains north of town there are large areas of land with good elevations (from 1000 to 2000m) which have the potential to produce high quality coffee.
The farms are beautiful. The coffee is grown under a mix of shade trees most of which are native to the area and provide plenty of habitat for birds and animals. This past week we had a meeting up at one of the farms where they were harvesting and processing coffee. We went with the regional engineer from the Honduran coffee institute, and the manager of a regional Cooperative that we are looking to partner with. Getting up to the farm involves a couple hours of steep, muddy, rocky, mountain roads and ends up in a pristene valley, source of the Olancho River.

The pictures are on David's camera. I'll post them as soon as I can get them from David. (to be continiued)