Sustainable Harvest

Producer Noe Moreno Salgado of the Montaña de Ocozaca co-op, left, walks among his coffee plants with visitors.

Clemente Santiago from the Sustainable Harvest office in Mexico is visiting the Montaña de Ocozaca cooperative in Veracruz this week. Yesterday, he spent time touring the farm of Noe Moreno Salgado, a coffee producer from the community of Zacamitla.

Clemente and Noe spoke about the upcoming harvest, which will start in December. Noe’s coffee production will be high because in the past few years he has replaced all his old coffee plants with younger trees that produce higher yields. He will harvest the results of this renovation this year — he predicts his plants will produce about 10 tons of coffee cherries per hectare, a yield only dreamed of by most small-scale farmers in Mexico. Over the course of the harvest season, he expects to pick ten kilos of ripe cherries from each Bourbon or Typica tree!