In 2022, the scientific journal Plos One published a study conducted by four researchers from the Institute of Natural Resource Sciences at the University of Applied Sciences in Zurich, which estimated the risk that coffee growers in the green belt of four countries — including Colombia- will face in 2050 due to climate change. The study concluded that lands suitable for coffee farming could be reduced by 50% due to drastic changes in precipitation patterns, substantial temperature increases, longer drought periods, and alterations in soil pH, resulting in the livelihoods of millions of people being affected. While the study discusses scenarios modelled for 2050, the effects of climate change on the coffee industry are already evident, exacerbated by regional climatic phenomena such as La Niña. In fact, Colombia endured the worst floods of the decade in 2022, resulting in the loss of nearly 1.5 million 60-kilogram coffee sacks.

Yes, climate change will dramatically alter the conditions under which we enjoy our coffee. It will impact the regions, quality, varieties, quantities, beneficiaries, and the most adversely affected. This is why innovation, both in cultivation and processing methods, environmental awareness, integration with nature, and the involvement of both buyers and consumers in decision-making processes are crucial in changing the course. Fortunately, there are already various coffee growers, trading companies, roasters, and other organisations in Colombia working to prevent us from colliding with the iceberg outlined in the aforementioned study. They shared their stories and perspectives on change with us.

History and Context

Coffee, originally from Ethiopia or Yemen (the final answer is still up for debate), arrived in Colombia in the hands of the Jesuits approximately 300 years ago, where it rooted deep and thrived robustly. Fernando Gast, the former director of the National Coffee Research Center (CENICAFÉ), describes how coffee entered through the departments of Casanare and Santander, where it began to be cultivated in the wild underbrush, shaded by other trees. The cafetos, some of which reached the age of 80, were not aggressively pruned (as in the case of more intrusive pruning techniques like ‘zoqueo,’ which involves removing several trunks and stems to promote the growth of the stronger ones) because they were an integral part of rural families’ subsistence farming (pan coger). In the 19th century, as coffee gained ground among Colombia’s people, its farming methods evolved, and its activity became widely commercialised. In the early 20th century, it entered international markets , accelerating the establishment of the National Federation of Coffee Growers in 1927, a guild entity driven by industrial businessmen from Medellin and what is called today the coffee-growing region.

Today, Colombia is an iconic player in the coffee industry, being the world’s largest producer of washed Arabica coffee. It exports between 11 and 13 million 60-kilogram sacks each year, representing approximately 13% to 15% of the country’s agricultural GDP and nearly 1% of the overall GDP, equivalent to around US$3.2 billion annually. Interestingly, domestic coffee consumption (around 1.5 to 2 million sacks annually) is not met by national production but rather through low-quality imports from Brazil, Ecuador, and Vietnam. That’s why most Colombian cafes serve an entirely different cup, a world apart from the aromatic, sweet and acidic blend that makes its way overseas.

Colombian coffee farming is primarily led by small producers, partly due to the country’s geography and topography. Approximately 95% of coffee is produced by farmers who live on plots of just over one hectare. The federation guarantees the purchase of their entire production through cooperatives and private sector allies as a form of protection. However, the price is subject to the fluctuations and speculation on the New York and London stock exchanges (a dynamic that deserves further examination in another context).

The federation also provides a robust capacity building service that provides technical and scientific training to improve agricultural practices with over 1,500 agronomists deployed throughout the country. “This ensures access to high-quality, resistant seeds against la rolla and la broca (the coffee rust fungus and the Coffee Berry Borer, the main pests), as well as technical assistance in managing crops and coffee processing centres.” assures Gast.

Unlike Brazil, a country with extensive open-air coffee monocultures watered by irrigation systems, most coffee in Colombia is grown in shaded conditions and watered with natural precipitation. Only in Antioquia and some areas of the coffee region have they transitioned to open-air cultivation. As Gast explains, shade is a crucial factor affecting coffee quality (along with height above sea level). It also plays a significant role in biodiversity as shade-grown coffee is usually accompanied by fruit trees and native vegetation, improving soil quality and increasing the presence of native fauna. Shade-grown coffee is also more resilient to climate change, as it increases soil absorption capacity, protecting the crops from prolonged droughts.

Coffee of the Young - Jardín, Antioquia

In Colombia, there are countless ‘paisa’ towns, but none as truly paisa as Jardín. It features multi pantone green slopes, colourful colonial houses, a central square, an imposing basilica, and a lot of coffee. In this enclave, Sebastián Quiroz gets up early every day to work on his parcel. Sebastián is what the US calls an outlier — in a context where the average age of farmers is 53, and where the generational transition of rural work is at high risk due to depopulation, he took over the management and administration of his farm at the age of 28, where he works alongside his brothers, parents, and wife. “This is 4G coffee farming: the four generations work the land together,” he says, laughing.

In 2014, Sebastián bought his land, located in the La Arbolada rural district, 30 minutes from the central town. The soil was eroded, and the nutrients depleted. They began transitioning to clean, chemical-free agriculture. Along with coffee, they added various crops and animals for the family’s sustenance: plantains, beans, lettuce, tomatoes, onions, eggs, chickens, pigs, bees, and even fish. As the land regenerated, they began to restore the riverside forest reserve, which now covers 32% of the property. Guayacan, cedar, and walnut trees are some of the native varieties planted that contribute to natural and continuous soil improvement, a critical factor in sustainable agriculture.

“Because of the high costs of the certification label and the type of farming methods my neighbours implement, we cannot say our coffee is organic, but we are working towards it. (...) Today, there are eight people in my region who are committed to environmental sustainability and polyculture, but we need many more,” he explains.

Sebastián transformed the agricultural approach, and has also ensured that the process of harvesting, processing, fermenting, packaging, and transportation meet the highest standards for specialty coffee in the region. “No pillar can fail. We currently guarantee a cup rating of 85, but we aim to standardize it at 87 points.” Coffee cups are rated based on quality, aroma, and sensory profile on a scale from 0 to 100, and only coffees scoring above 80 points are considered specialty coffees.

They’ve planted three coffee varieties that have shown good performance under agroecological standards: Cenicafé 1, Caturra chirroso, and Castilla rosario. Commercially, Sebastián operates on multiple fronts and sells coffee in various forms to meet the customer’s needs: parchment, green, roasted, ground, both with and without branding. “The more processing, the better the price, as it adds more value.”

The journey has been long and challenging. Despite being a specialist in specialty coffees — he completed his technical training and has been involved in coffee farming since he was a child — growing agroecological coffee is not easy. The transition to sustainable and clean agriculture is gradual, marked by much trial and error, and offers fewer support and subsidies compared to conventional farming. “Many believe we’re crazy and that producing organic coffee is not profitable. Well, we are crazy because we’re doing something different for our country.”

Rural areas of Colombia are facing a shortage of labour, partly due to the poor compensation received by farmers over decades, making it an unattractive option for today’s youth. But Sebastián believes that besides better rural education options — an undeniable debt that the Colombian government owes to farmers — there is a need to portray the countryside in a more favourable light to gain the respect it deserves. “The countryside gives us more than what we give it; the countryside provides us with food. Why would one go to the city when the food runs out?”

Natural-processed Coffee - Algeciras, Huila

Edwin Zambrano, also known as El Mono, and his mother Nohora Sepúlveda are from Huila, currently the highest coffee-producing region in Colombia. They both learned the coffee trade from Mono’s father and have been working on their farms in the rural area of the municipality of Algeciras for several years. Algeciras is a red zone, it was once a stronghold of the now-defunct FARC guerrillas and shares a border with Caquetá, one of the regions most affected by the ongoing armed conflict. Amid this heat — not just figuratively, as there are days when the temperature reaches 35 degrees Celsius — Edwin and his mother find peace and happiness in coffee, managing and supervising the pulping, fermentation, and drying process. It was during this transformation process 5 years ago, that Edwin and Nohora ventured down a different path: natural-processed coffee.

As mentioned earlier, Colombia is king in the production of washed Arabica coffee, which has a specific smooth sensory profile. However, there are other types of coffee — perhaps less smooth, more complex, and unwashed — that are equally interesting and appealing to the specialty coffee market. Natural-processed (‘cafe natural’ in Spanish) is fermented and dried with both the outer husk and pulp, meaning the coffee cherries are not pulped, and the mucilage remains attached to the beans. This imparts sweetness and body to the final cup. It’s a different process from washed coffee, where the outer husk of the cherry is removed leaving only the coffee grains before the fermentation begins.

While the natural-processing of coffee is a millennia-old technique, fermenting and drying coffee with its husk and pulp is an arduous task. The risk of over-fermentation or even spoilage is high, especially in rainy and humid climates. However, as they say in Colombia, Nohora and El Mono ‘le cogieron el tiro’ (meaning they got the hang of it) “after much trial and error, of course”, Edwin explains, as he recalls challenging times of lost harvests and unbearable smells. Nowadays, they have refined their fermentation processes in tanks, which can take between 4 and 6 days depending on the climate, and they perform the final drying in a heated silo to ensure the quality and stability of the product during transport and commercialisation.

What are the advantages of natural-processed coffee, given the challenges in its production? On the one hand it’s price, as, at least in this region, natural-processed coffee cherries are typically paid more than washed cherries. While market volatility is inevitable, in recent years, Edwin and Nohora have received almost 40% higher prices for their naturally-processed coffee. In operational and labour terms, natural-processed coffee shifts the burden of cherry removal to the buyer, reducing the need for certain machinery and lowering costs and labour.

However, the most significant advantage is the environmental impact. Coffee cultivation is resource-intensive, both in terms of manpower and natural resources such as water use. The Water Footprint Network estimates that a 125 ml cup of coffee requires 140 litres of water. A significant portion is used in the pulping and washing stages, which don’t occur with naturally-processed coffee, reducing overall water consumption in the processing stage. Furthermore, it’s not just the use of water but rather water pollution. The pulps and mucilage waste produce leachates that, when poorly managed, contaminate rivers and soil.

Despite the production challenges, Nohora and Edwin are happy with their transition to a natural process, which is also the name [El Natural] of El Mono’s truck that carries their loads to be sold in Neiva, the capital of Huila.

The Sustainable Coffee Buyers Guide

Coffee is a commodity — a major one in the food segment — and its consumption is massive worldwide. In 2022, the world consumed approximately 170,500 million 60-kilogram sacks of coffee. The New York, London, and Singapore exchanges engage in daily price speculation, betting on future contracts or projections of scarcity or oversupply. However, in this realm of rampant capitalism, producers face the most significant risks.

Every day, the National Coffee Growers Federation publishes the prices of a sack of dry parchment coffee (125 kilograms) with its specific variations. This value results from combining the price of the New York stock exchange, the differential paid for Colombian coffee by traders worldwide, and other variables such as a bonus or discount depending on the type of coffee. In 2022, prices reached the highest levels of the decade, but since April 2023, they have plummeted. According to Lavazza, a global coffee market giant, prices will continue to decline next year.

To mitigate the risks posed by this volatility to coffee farmers, several marketers and roasters have begun working with more stable pricing schemes to ensure that farmers receive a fair price. But how does one assess what’s truly fair? In this context, the Sustainability Coffee Buyers Guide (SCBG) was created. It’s an initiative by Azahar Coffee, a Colombian exporter company that aims to transform coffee systems from a social sustainability perspective.

Determining a fair price begins with understanding the true context of the farms from which coffee is purchased. In Colombia, it’s more expensive to produce coffee in northern Huila than in Nariño. Therefore, a fair price means covering the costs of production, which can vary not just between countries but also among municipalities and regions, while ensuring that farmers can save, reinvest, earn, and prosper.

After three years of collecting field data to calculate the cost of living and production in different coffee regions, the company released the first edition of the guide, which includes a digital tool that allows buyers to determine whether the price they are paying is fair or not. The guide introduces four price fairness indicators that measure the financial viability of coffee sales.

The first indicator is the poverty price, which is a price level just above the poverty line. It’s not an aspirational price but an eye-opener for buyers to realise that a farmer receiving this price — or less — operates at a loss and will remain below the poverty line. The second — the legal price — is tied to the country’s legal minimum wage, but this doesn’t mean it’s a living wage. It’s followed by the decent wage price, covering basic needs for a decent living but with little to no saving capacity. Finally, there’s the prosperous price, which Azahar invites all its buyers to pay. This is the only price that allows coffee farmers to save 20% of their income and pay their harvesters a living wage. In other words, it’s the only price that can guarantee social and economic sustainability and business scalability.

Tyler Youngblood, CEO of Azahar Coffee, and Vera Espíndola, the Guide’s Director, led the platform’s development which currently works for farms in Colombia and Mexico. There’s both a free version and a paid Premium subscription that offers more detailed information. With the free tool, buyers can see different ‘on-farm’ prices to understand how much income can be generated from a purchase, expressed in the aforementioned price categories.

Youngblood and Espíndola strongly believe in the power of information and effective communication for business decision-making. “Our hypothesis is that by seeing the actual price needed by farmers to achieve a Prosperous Income, and knowing that the information is based on statistically significant, real-time data of yields and production costs, coffee buyers will be inclined to pay higher prices.”

The guide also supports coffee farmers. It includes a Farm Calculator specifically designed for producers to visualise the relationship between prices, yields, and farm costs. This allows them to compare their operation with neighbouring farms, better understand the overall market scheme, and negotiate prices more knowledgeably.

It’s interesting to assess the impact of the guide’s launch on the prices paid by Azahar’s buyers. In comparison to 2022, payments for prosperous coffee rose by 32% in 2023, and legal prices increased by 31% — meaning many buyers stopped paying poverty prices. However, prices for decent income decreased by 50%, but this is partially correlated with the increase in prosperous prices. Initiatives like the SCBG contribute to strengthening the importance of social sustainability, which will only be achieved by creating tools that provide education and training, while generating awareness on both the buyer and farmer sides.

Colombia and coffee have been historically understood as one and the same, despite the real conditions in which coffee growers live and how they farm. Sebastián, Edwin, Nohora, and Azahar demonstrate that conscious and clean farming, sustainable transformation processes, and fair pricing schemes are part of a new way to produce, sell, and enjoy Colombian coffee. It’s a vision of change that challenges the projections and scenarios discussed at the beginning of this article. 🐟