Category: Climate Change

Analyzing Farm Profitability: Land Equivalency Ratio and Gross Profit

To address the drivers of migration- debt/prices and climate pressures- highlighted in the last post, we need to consistently seek to gain a deeper understanding of farmer livelihoods. CRS used the Land Equivalency Ratio tool during the last agricultural cycle to analyze the economics of coffee-based agroforestry systems in San Marcos, Guatemala. Land Equivalency Ratio […]

Win-win: Blue Harvest providing solutions that help cooperatives get back on their feet while PROTECTING WATER

In Blue Harvest, we have been working on improving water use efficiency and waste water treatment in wet mills, protecting water recharge areas in the farms by applying soil and water conservation practices (here and here) with a focus on regenerative coffee , as well as working with water system operators and water committees to […]

THE TIME TO REGENERATE COFFEE IS NOW, AND IT STARTS WITH HEALTHY SOIL

2018-04-20 Comments

  It is time to move beyond the idea of sustainable coffee. Sustaining something assumes that what we have is already good enough. Yet numerous studies have shown that if the coffee industry does not change its current “business-as-usual” approach, we will not have quality coffee in the future. And this will hurt everyone that […]

What water smart coffee milling looks like

In the previous few posts, I’ve been writing about our recent work in Nicaragua, improving the water use efficiency and minimizing the pollution from small coffee wet mills. You can see these posts here: Wetmill makeovers! What’s the impact of these mills?  Even better than reading about the impact and the design (more posts coming […]

Measuring ROI of farm management activities on water resources in the Coffeelands

Measuring how better management of coffee farms improve water resources in the Coffeelands Blue Harvest started as an idea of how to restore and improve the management of water resources in coffee producing areas in El Salvador, Honduras and Nicaragua, while increasing the productivity of coffee farms located in our target watersheds.  As we have […]

Robusta farmers rewarded for quality in the 2nd Taza Dorada

The Coffeelands blogs suffers from a few coffee prejudices, which we readily admit to.  Our geographical base is in Central America and therefore our coverage tends to be towards issues that are of great concern in this part of the world.  We’re unabashedly Arabica centric as well.  You’ll find it in our daily drink and […]

ROYA IS EVOLVING. SO WHAT NOW?

World Coffee Research has spoken.  Lempira, a high-yielding, popular variety planted throughout Honduras is no longer what thousands of farmers hoped that it would be: resistant to coffee leaf rust.  While there is not yet any conclusive scientific evidence that la roya has evolved into a new race or strain, all indications are pointing to […]