Pachamama, Peru
Country: Peru
Department: Cajamarca
Producers: Eudosia Puelles Troyes, Elvira Guerrero Navarro, Oralia Garcia Alvarez
Varieties: Bourbon, Caturra, Catimor
Processing: Washed
Although it is more common to think of a coffee grower as a male figure, arguably overlooking the impact of women on coffee production, when you start looking more in detail, this view is completely off. When women get fully involved in the production of specialty coffee, the benefits can be seen with healthier families, better farm management regarding incomes and savings. This limited edition seeks to recognize and encourage these empowered, hard-working women, who are calling the shots, either the ones who are just starting or the ones that have been in the coffee business for a long time. Either the ones that work with their families, or the ones who manage their own farms and sustain their families through the production of coffee. We seek to show their faces and their impact in this industry. All of them are resilient, fierce and go getters in communities where males usually dominate. We invite you to be part of their journey, see them progress and give them all the recognition that they deserve.
Pachamama refers to the Incan goddess that represents Mother Earth, nature, all the elements and their connections. It’s a perfect representation of female coffee producers that we want to showcase in this limited edition. We find women who not only produce amazing coffee, but who with their organic practices and deep gratitude, believe in respecting and protecting nature. We also showcase women who face adversities to achieve recognition in a historically male-dominated environment. This is an opportunity to make them stand out and achieve their dreams.
The three women behind this coffee are Elvira Guerrero y Eudosia Puelles from Jaen and Oralia Guerrero from San Ignacio, both areas belonging to the department of Cajamarca in the north of Peru limiting with Ecuador. The three of them have learned about coffee from their parents who already where producing coffee, and a such have been closing to this beautiful tree from a young age. Elvira is the one who has been the longest producing coffee starting in 1997 while Eudosia began in 2013 and Oralia in 2014. The three of them started to look for quality in their coffee at around the same year with Elvira in 2018, Eudosia in 2015 and Oralia in 2017. Both Elvira and Eudosia started with their own coffee production after getting a divorce and the drive of wanting to start something by themselves. In the case of Oralia, she works the farm alongside her husband where each one participates in the production of coffee. Since they started looking for high quality coffee at their farms, it has brought only good things. In the case of Elvira, she has seen how her farm has improved day by day, and her quality of life getting better. As per Eudosia she has also seen a change in her quality of life, being able to be independent and working in what she loves. On the other hand, being in specialty coffee has changed Oralia’s way of life, improved the education of her kids, and sparked an interest for high-qua- lity coffee. In the case of Elvira, at the farm she has the help of her oldest son, Jose Carlos, who is an agronomist, while Eudosia has the help of her daughter Lesli.
The varieties found in these three farms ranges from Catimor, Catuai, Bourbon, Typica, Caturra, and Pache, with the size of the farms ranging from 2 to 4 hectares. The average way they process the coffee starts with a careful cherry picking of the ripest which are then pulped. Afterwards, the coffee is fermented in open-air tanks from 30 to 36 hours and then washed. As per the drying, it takes in average 15 days but dependent on the climate with only Eudosia doing it in a solar dryer, Elvira over a plastic tarp with shade and Oralia in a tarp at the patio. Elvira is the only one who floats the cherries before pulping to take out any foreign material such as leaves or branches, and the less dens beans.
As a parting message, the three of them would like to tell other women “Keep pushing forward, don’t give up, as they can improve day by day and now a day are an important piece of the world of coffee and are characterized as being fighters who are making history.”
