Don Pedro, a full-time farmer in Guatemala
During my most recent visit to Guatemala, I had the opportunity to meet Don Pedro Hu Ortega, a coffee farmer who told me what it’s like to live and work on a coffee farm. During our lengthy conversation, he explained to me the specific tasks that an organic coffee producer must perform to harvest the crop.
Don Pedro receives an annual visit from the certification inspectors and has to work hard year round to meet the standards. To him it’s worth it because, in his words, organic farming is a form of production that allows one to remain conscious of his impact on the environment while also producing a good, marketable product – something very important to his family’s quality of life.
Don Pedro learned to grow organic coffee from the Chajulense Association, a local cooperative made up of coffee producers and exporters. He was one of the first growers to focus on this form of production. He even went to Mexico to take a course from a cooperative called UCIRI, an organization with extensive experience in organic farming.
As an organic producer, he must undertake a number of activities. Three that he considers very important are shade management, pruning and fertilization. There are, of course, other activities that require a lot of attention. Seed selection for his nursery, for example, is a task that requires both skill and thorough observation in order to identify the most well-suited and productive plants.
Don Pedro told me that he’s seen producers who pay little attention to their coffee fields. Sometimes they only clean their fields just before the harvest. He shared:
The advice I would give to other producers is to be conscious of the importance of doing all of these necessary tasks—producing fertilizer as well as other tasks. I know that if we pay attention to coffee, it’s profitable. The objective is to be profitable in our work. Why am I going to grow coffee if it doesn’t pay, if it won’t allow me to pay my bills? And that’s exactly what one’s looking for, for coffee to be a profitable activity.
Don Pedro has three hectares, a little more than seven acres, sown with coffee and, because coffee is a biannual crop, this means his harvest alternates between a good year and a bad one. This year he produced only 50 sacks of parchment coffee, but in a good year he may produce between 60 and 65.
When I asked Don Pedro if he thought it possible to make a living by producing coffee, he responded immediately with an emphatic yes. What he didn’t mention, though, is that it’s possible for Don Pedro because he engages in other activities to supplement his income.
In a nearby community he manages some 50 beehives of European honeybees, whose honey he exports to Germany through the Association Chajulense. On his coffee plantation he produces different types of bananas, cardamom, various types of citrus and annatto (also known as urucú, a condiment, food coloring and medicinal plant). He also has five head of cattle and chickens for meat and eggs.
In all honesty I was surprised by his confidence in his ability to make a living from coffee farming. What I came to realize, though, is that Don Pedro considers himself, above all else, a coffee farmer. Any other activities he engages in are secondary. They are not quantifiable to him. They don’t count strictly as income, even though they are, almost certainly, what allow him to continue coffee farming. The reasons for this are complex and require much more space than a blog post can offer.
Without a doubt Don Pedro is a diversified and hard-working producer whose livelihood is not exclusively dependent upon the coffee harvest. It’s clear that his production methods are in many ways more sustainable than those of other farmers. This is due to his respect for the environment, diversification, balance, and the connections between his production systems. For example, his plantation’s shade comes from plants and trees that provide income, food and organic fertilizer. He uses the earth in a conscientious way, be it to grow crops, provide pasture or produce honey.
Through this visit, I learned that integrating product diversification into coffee plantations is pivotal to maintaining food security. Putting all of one’s eggs into one basket has always been a mistake. Don Pedro’s work served as a reminder of the importance of diversification, and is an example to us all.