It would seem logical that the smallest Central American coffee-growing country would produce microlots, but historically, much of the coffee was blended and sold to mills, without much lot differentiation and separation. The rise of specialty coffee in El Salvador has inspired many producers to start to identify and isolate individual varieties, and to experiment with sorting and processing, as a way of attracting buyers and getting higher prices, but access to those resources can still be difficult for smaller growers.
For the past few years, Café Imports green buyer Piero Cristiani—who is from El Salvador, and whose mother has a long history in coffee there—has embarked on a project designed to identify, reward, and bring to market the exceptional results of the hard, innovative work that producers are increasingly interested in doing here.
Focusing on the region of Chalatenango, Piero has partnered with a cupper and a local mill to buy small, select microlots from producers—some separated by variety, some by process, and some by both. We are buying the coffee in parchment and doing the ruling and final sorting and bagging ourselves, which allows for more quality control as well as the ability to package some of these very special small lots in custom 35-kilo Pequeños bags, to create more widespread access to these coffees to roasters.
Roberto Adonay Dubon owns a 3.5-hectare farm called La Esperanza, which is planted with 2.5 manzanas of coffee (around 7,000 trees—Pacas and Pacamara varieties). The coffee is Natural process. Roberto Adonay hires five extra people to help during peak harvest, and he is interested in paying good prices for good quality work.
Finca La Esperanza has produced about 28 quintales of coffee for the past few years, and this year there was a drought that that slowed production slightly. He hopes to expand by about a half-hectare this year.
To the roasters who buy his coffee, Roberto Adonay says, "I would like them to understand my process so I can understand theirs. I would lik feedback to understand what I can do better." He is very interested in finding a buyer-partner with whom he can develop specific lots in future years.
We are proud to offer these micro-microlots, and can’t wait for you and your customers to experience the delicious stuff that comes in these small packages.
For more information about coffee production in El Salvador, visit our El Salvador Origin Page.
