The International & Trusted Voice Of JULY 2009

The Tea & Coffee Industries Since 1901

Guatemalan Gold:
Doing Good &
Tasting Better
TEA TRICKS FROM
A LITERARY MASTER

THE DISH ON DECAF

HOW TO KEEP YOUR
CUSTOMERS COMING BACK
Contents
ISSN 0040-0343

( July 2009 Vol.181/No.7 )

Features
16
16 How Quality Coffee Bears Fruit
in Guatemala
By Christine K. Wilson

20 Updates in the Decaf Market

By Joseph Rivera

24 Resilience in the Face of the Recession:

NCA Recap
By Michael Segal

28 In Sri Lanka:
Tourism with a Captial “Tea”
By Larry Luxner

32 Good in Guatemala:
20 Hope in Bloom
By José Carlos Léon & Kyle Freund

34 Eleven Steps to Heaven and

a “Nice Cup of Tea”
By Dr. Terry Mabbett

40 Eleven Formulas to
28 Hook Your Customers
By Keith Hayward
34

32
40
Departments On the Cover

8 Editor’s Page 46 Trade News The beauty

of sprouting
10 World News 47 People News coffee.
14 Calendar 48 Equipment & Packaging News
44 Product Showcase 50 Marketplace, Advertiser Index

6 TEA & COFFEE TRADE JOURNAL | www.teaandcoffee.net

( Guatemala Coffee )
Consequential Coffee:
How Quality Coffee Bears
Fruit in Guatemala
Each Guatemalan coffee is as different as the region it
stems from. Here, get an intimate tour of local estates,
their coffees and their culture.
( By Christine K. Wilson, Photos by Santiago Albert Pons )
W
e had been traveling for some
time when I begin to wonder
just how much deeper can we go
into this land. It is nearly dark, and
although it’s not late, the perpendicular
9,000-foot mountains have all but
blocked the afternoon sun. This is
Huehuetenango, in northwestern
Guatemala, just steps away from the
Mexican border. Where there are no
straight roads, nothing flat, only a series
of narrow valleys that with each bend in
the road reveal yet another spectacular
view. This is coffee-growing country, one
of several growing regions in Guatemala,
and home to the award-winning farm El
Injerto. I am anxious to see what kind of
quality is being produced in the different
regions of Guatemala, and to find out
16 TEA & COFFEE TRADE JOURNAL | www.teaandcoffee.net
Don Arturo Aguirre at El Injerto,
Huehuetenango
how coffee production can have a positive
impact on today’s social and environmen-
tal issues. El Injerto is an impressive place
to begin my journey.
“We are almost there,” Arturo
Aguirre, El Injerto’s owner, assures me
sensing my impatience. I can tell, though,
that in these far-flung regions, almost
there can mean several more hours or even
days. But for Aguirre, El Injerto seems far
less remote now. When he first took over
the century-old farm at the age of 15, he
had to travel there by mule, braving a gru-
eling eight-day ride from the town of
Huehuetenango. “Slowly we built over 18
kilometers of roads, terraced the steep
hillsides and experimented with varietals.
Eventually, we greatly increased our pro-
duction from the original 300 bags,” he
tells me. Clearly, Aguirre is perseverant —
just growing coffee on these unimaginable
slopes 6,500 feet in the air is a challenge.
But what does he do to produce such a
high-quality product, earning top scores
and prices at the Cup of Excellence seven
years in a row?
According to Aguirre, his decision to
divide the plantation by varietals made a
tremendous difference. Back in the 1970s
while everyone was focusing on produc-
tion, he began to focus on quality.
Separately planting and processing his ele-
gant Bourbons, fruity Pacamaras and
large-bean Maragogypes provided him
with insights into plant behavior and cup
characteristics.
When we hike up the dizzyingly steep
hills the next day, I get a bird’s-eye view of
the rows of sharp-leafed izotes neatly sep-
arating each varietal. Each section of the
farm is also organized by lot. Each lot has
its own name and unique features, includ-
ing altitude and soil. This identifying
information follows the coffee all the way
to the buyer like a birth certificate.
For Aguirre, planting quality is only
half of the equation. “What matters most
is our people,” he tells me, “that is why we
invest in training them properly.”
Following Aguirre to the mill, I get a sense
of the enormous challenge of producing
both quality and quantity. Each day, near-
ly 1,200 pickers individually turn in their
lot to be weighed and processed. The
order that has been so diligently kept in
the field must now be maintained during
the processing. And that is no small feat.
At this stage, the human factor is critical
for both transparency and quality purpos-
es. Walking through the mill, Aguirre
enumerates some of his practices. “A pile
of coffee should not exceed 60 centime-
ters. The coffee needs to be submerged in
spring water for 24 to 36 hours. You
should never fill the dryers more than
80% or the beans will sweat.”
Hearing about so many innovative
details prompts me ask how he knows
how to do this. “You have to be disci-
plined in your search for quality,” he tells
me. He explains that he and his team con-
stantly experiment, document, experi-
( Guatemala Coffee )
ment some more, and then test the coffee
by cupping it. “Let me show you,” he says
as he guides me past the dryers to the back
of the mill where an unassuming door
leads into an enviable cupping room.
The smoky, sweet smell of freshly
roasted coffee fills the air and a table with
freshly poured samples begs for a tasting.
“This is where you come to really find out
about quality,” says German García, one
of El Injerto’s young managers, as he
checks a new lot. “Before we started cup-
ping,” he tells me, “we did not understand
how the way we picked and processed the
coffee affected the taste. Now we under-
stand how one bean can ruin a whole
cup.” Their involvement in the cupping
process has motivated the personnel to be
better managers in the field and mill. As I
eagerly follow García, working my way
down the table, I taste the sweet melon of
the Pacamara, and indulge in the refined
acidity of the Bourbon. We compare
notes. The experience feels especially
rewarding for the opportunity to see how
even in this remote region, coffee offers
more than just employment; it is a vehicle
for personal and professional develop-
ment. I bid my new friends farewell and
head east to the really remote Ixil triangle
to learn how cooperative coffee affects the
daily life of the people of Chajul.
Coffee Culture
On the road to Chajul the differences in
geography and culture strike me almost
immediately. We are just a few hours away
from Huehuetenango and the narrow val-
leys have given way to wide open spaces
with clayish soils in a palette of colors
varying from orange to lavender. Time
also seems to have stood still here, as the
landscape of pine trees, one-room adobe
homes and the occasional shepherd hark
back to another era.
Once in Chajul, the hillsides get green-
er and the women’s attire brighter and more
ornate, creating an alluring mix of simplici-
ty and richness like nowhere else. I have
come to visit the Asociación Chajulense, a
3,300-member cooperative that produces
organic, Fair Trade certified coffee. Its
members are native Ixil spread across 57
communities around Chajul where they
18 TEA & COFFEE TRADE JOURNAL | www.teaandcoffee.net
Associascion Chajulense – Textile Women’s
Association in Chajul
produce Arabica coffee with crisp acidity
and chocolate notes in the cup.
What coffee means to this region is
summed up by Arcadio Gallindo, the asso-
ciation president, who talks of coffee not
just in pounds and quintals, but in terms of
the profound social effect it has had on the
region. Gallindo explains that this remote
corner of the Ixil triangle was one of the
hardest hit during the country’s 36 years of
armed insurgency. In Chajul, the war “left
nothing behind,” he says. Trying to bring
life back to their community, those who
had grown coffee before the war began to
replant. In 1989 they joined forces to sell
their first container. After the success of
that first sale, the association continued to
grow, establishing a dry mill and coordinat-
ing sales in Europe and the U.S., where
today they ship over 28,000 bags.
To get an idea of what it is like to pro-
duce in this region, you have to get out into
the neighboring communities where the
coffee is grown, which are spread over 70
kilometers from the center of town. One
such area is Santa Belina. A 20-minute drive
from Chajul, the road to Santa Belina
climbs into the mountains where it is sud-
denly much greener. There is no sign of the
scattered deforestation seen nearby. Instead,
coffee trees, shade trees from the Inga fami-
ly and cypresses cover the hills. Coffee is
truly artisinal here, grown in small, roughly
half-acre lots, wet-milled by hand and set
out to dry on doll-sized patios next to each
home. For the people here coffee is clearly a
way of life and a family affair.
Coffee has brought Chajul back to life.
According to Gallindo, “If it weren’t for cof-
fee, Chajul would have been abandoned.”
Coffee has not just brought work, but has
become a catalyst for other agricultural and
social projects. “The goal is always to pro-
duce quality,” he tells me, “because that is
how we can earn a better price for our cof-
fee and continue to invest in Chajul.”
A weaving cooperative, known as
Unidas por la Vida (United for Life), is one
example of the positive impact coffee has
had in Chajul. It brings together more than
95 women, many of them coffee growers,
to produce textiles. As Juana Hu, one of the
association leaders points out, “It allows
women to work from their homes while still
caring for their families and their coffee.”
Just as importantly, their weaving provides
access to microloans and a chance to pre-
serve their cultural traditions.
The weavers get together in the base-
ment of the coffee association’s building. As
I step inside I am overwhelmed by all the
colors and patterns. Yarns in mustard, violet
and crimson hues are spun on gently mov-
ing wooden wheels by women so elegantly
dressed it hardly seems like it could be an
ordinary day at work. This enterprising
group of women is a clear example of the
positive ripple effect coffee production can
have on communities.
Truly Green Coffee
I leave Chajul and continue my journey
winding through the Cuchumatanes
mountain range, past Sacapulas and
Chichicastenango, to the south side of
Lake Atitlán. I then head up one of the vol-
canoes to a farm known as Los Andes. This
region has gotten a lot of attention lately
for its innovative, sustainable coffee pro-
duction — a model that focuses on both
conservation and productivity. Here, coffee
is grown alongside or within a natural for-
est system. The forest provides environ-
mental services like erosion protection and
water and nutrient cycling, while the coffee
production provides income to conserve Olga Hazard explains, “Our vision is to long iridescent tail of the Quetzal as it
the forest. It is a symbiotic relationship that ensure that agricultural production, flies overhead. I hold my breath. It is truly
ensures sustainability for both. human development and environmental magical here.
Los Andes is just one of more than 25 conservation are carried out in a harmo-
farms in the region that have established nious and sustainable manner.” I am Christine K. Wilson manages Finca El
private nature reserves on their property, encouraged to find that quality coffee pro- Pintado, a certified-organic coffee farm in
creating a critical biological corridor that duces not just a great cup, but also a myr- Antigua, Guatemala, and writes extensively on
extends more than 6,000 acres across iad of opportunities for both environmen- coffee, travel and lifestyle. She is currently free-
multiple ecosystems on the slopes of the tal conservation and social development. lancing for Rainforest Alliance, developing a
Atitlán Volcano. This natural haven “Mire, ahora—Look up now,” whis- Best Practices Manual for Coffee. Christine
attracts more than one hundred species of pers Chus. As I glance up I see the meter- can be reached at cwilson@fincaelpintado.com
migratory and endemic birds. But there is
just one I am dying to see.
Dawn breaks early at Los Andes and
the clarity of the early morning light pro-
vides a long-distance view from the farm-
house all the way to the Pacific Ocean. By
eleven o’clock, however, the moist, veil-like
clouds have begun their ascent into the
mountain and infused the air with the nec-
essary humidity to be called a cloud forest.
Los Andes produces Utz certified coffee,
as well as organic tea, quinine and
macadamia nuts. Quality coffee has not
only had a profound effect on the area’s eco-
nomic and social development, but is one of
the driving forces behind environmental
conservation. After an interesting tour of the
coffee plantation and mill, I decided to see
for myself how coffee can contribute to bio-
diversity by taking an early-morning bird
watching tour.
It is fair to say that I have none of the
qualifications needed to be a good bird-
watcher. I am loud, clumsy, and hate to
wake up early. But the prospect of seeing my
first Resplendent Quetzal (Pharomachrus
mocinno), the mythical emerald-green bird
sacred to the ancient Maya, is enough to get
me out of bed and hiking. It also helps that
I am being taken to see this rare and myste-
rious creature, by none other than Jesús
Lucas, better known by his nickname Chus.
Chus is no ordinary bird guide. He is as
much an integral part of the Los Andes
cloud forests as the Quetzal itself. As he
guides me through the lush forest, Chus
melodically calls out to both male and
female Quetzals with such accuracy that
sometimes they answer back. During our
walk we also hear toucans and tanagers and
find a pair of jaguar tracks on the path.
It is easy to forget that we are on a
hard-working coffee farm. As its owner

JULY 2009 19