About the Farm
Wilmer Martinez Terrones owns two hectares of coffee in the Shumbana village in Santa Rosa de la Yunga. The farm sits at 1850masl (altitude) and is planted with caturra, typica and pache. Wilmer picks and processes his coffee himself and dries it on a lined patio for 10 days before delivering it to the Falcon Coffees warehouse in Jaén.
The Importance of the Area
Santa Rosa de la Yunga Santa Rosa de la Yunga belongs to the Jaén province in the region of Cajamarca. Santa Rosa is fairly isolated since it is located quite far from the city of Jaén and has poor roads and infrastructure. This isolation has meant that for many years the area has been dominated by local aggregators and the price for coffee has been consistently low, unlike some other areas of Jaen and San Ignacio which had at least seen a rise in the local market prices due to the huge FTO market.
In recent years, however, with the emergence of the specialty industry there has been a growing interest in high altitude areas, and Santa Rosa is blessed with high altitude and ideal growing conditions. Although it is still very underexplored, we have managed to form relationships with a group of 21 farmers who have been delivering very nice coffee and gradually improving as they become more aware of the quality premiums and attend training sessions.
Peru Overview
We have been working in Northern Peru for several years, buying specialty coffee from cooperatives and associations with whom we have built lasting relationships. Whilst a lot of the arrival quality we have seen in previous seasons has been good, we have struggled to impact upon that quality or make improvements in the supply chain as we would like. More importantly, the premiums we had been paying for quality rarely makes it directly back to producers, something we have had very little control over in previous years.
In Peru, like some other origins, coffee farmers are sensitive to market changes and often lack basic training and the incentive to produce higher qualities of coffee, as premiums often don’t materialise. For these reasons we decided we needed to change the way we buy coffee in Peru and work directly with producers, allowing us to control and improve upon existing quality and have full financial traceability.
Ensuring these two factors would help us to pay higher prices for the coffees and to make sure that producers received a fair price for the coffee they delivered us, above the market price. In order to do this, we set up a warehouse in Jaen and started to buy in parchment directly from producers.
The Cajamarca region holds a lot of potential for quality coffee, with ideal growing conditions and great varieties, but quality is often lost in picking, processing and drying, with producers lacking infrastructure and knowledge. The most vulnerable producers are those that are unassociated – those who aren’t members of a cooperative, association or organisation – and they represent 75% of producers in Northern Peru. These producers don’t have access to training sessions or premiums for quality or certifications, and their income is totally dependent on the market price.
Often, local aggregators – a buyer who lives in the same area – will come to the farm or house of a producer and buy their coffee for cash before selling it on; in some cases, directly to an exporter or more often to other traders and middlemen. This results in the producer being paid very little for their coffee and a lot of quality coffee is lost.
This shift in approach to sourcing will allow us to forge long term relationships directly with farmers, improve the coffee quality we can offer from these areas and increase producer household income through access to quality premiums. We now have over 438 registered farmers across the San Ignacio and Jaen provinces.
Attributes
| Cup Score | 86 |
| Cup Profile | Pineapple, blackberry, cherry, cane sugar. Sweet and syrupy. |
| Altitude | 1850 |
| Process | Washed |
| Varietal | Caturra & Catuai |
