Tag Archives: Honduras

ROYA IS EVOLVING. SO WHAT NOW?

2017-05-22 Comments Off on 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 […]

COFFEE LEAF RUST REARS ITS UGLY HEAD AGAIN

2017-05-08 Comments Off on COFFEE LEAF RUST REARS ITS UGLY HEAD AGAIN

Right in the build up to the SCA, there popped up a bit of news out of Honduras that caught my attention.  Like the villain in the in a cheesy horror movie, coffee leaf rust, better known as la roya, just won’t go away.   Initial reports in late March said that there was an outbreak […]

Coffee Supply Chain’s Hidden Heroes

2015-07-08 Comments Off on Coffee Supply Chain’s Hidden Heroes

Hollywood loves a good comeback story.  So when I think of the struggles of a coffee community in Honduras called Opatoro, I can’t help but think of them in terms of a Hollywood script.  The pitch might go something like this: In 2012, Dunia Martínez, newly elected mayor of Opatoro in rural Honduras, began receiving […]

427. A conversation with Ric Rhinehart on the future of coffee in Mesoamerica

2014-10-16 Comments Off on 427. A conversation with Ric Rhinehart on the future of coffee in Mesoamerica

Last week I participated in Let’s Talk Coffee, importer Sustainable Harvest’s annual value chain event, for the fifth time.  The content of the event was broader the caliber of the speakers higher than at any other LTC event I remember.  But the best presentation of the event—the one that still has me thinking the better […]

418. My summer in coffee

2014-08-18 Comments Off on 418. My summer in coffee

I am back in the office today after a long summer holiday in the United States.  The best thing about my annual visit to the States–after spending quality time with my family and friends, of course–is the coffee. This summer the coffee was especially good.  With this variation on the “what-I-did-this-summer” back-to-school essay, I want […]

409. The coming crisis in the coffeelands

2014-06-05 Comments Off on 409. The coming crisis in the coffeelands

The Famine Early Warning System Network (FEWS NET) released another update on the food security situation in Central America last week.  I have not been working directly on our response to coffee leaf rust in Central America, and I have not been publishing much here lately.  But I felt compelled by a “lost-in-translation” moment in […]

387. Coffee leaf rust update: Stressed acute food insecurity

2014-02-17 Comments Off on 387. Coffee leaf rust update: Stressed acute food insecurity

Editor’s Note: This post has been revised to include additonal detail about the “stressed acute food insecurity” classification applied to Guatemala and Honduras by FEWS NET. – – – – – The Famine Early Warning System Network (FEWSNET), a USAID-funded initiative that monitors hunger in chronically food insecure countries around the world, late last week […]

365. This is what vulnerability looks like

2013-06-17 Comments Off on 365. This is what vulnerability looks like

As a principle, I believe that we learn better from direct experience than from books and data and graphics.  And as a matter of experience, I know that traveling to the coffeelands can be a source of endless illumination about the secret lives of coffee farmers.  Nothing helps us understand the vulnerability of poor households […]

362. Coffee rust and farmworkers

2013-05-29 Comments Off on 362. Coffee rust and farmworkers

Our work in the coffeelands over the past 10 years has focused on small-scale family farmers, but we recognize that the seasonal laborers who pick coffee, often migrants, are arguably the most vulnerable actors in the coffee chain.  And there are a lot of them.  According to PROMECAFE data, more than 1.7 million people work […]