Day 5 continued

Better than entry than never!

I wanted to take some time to explain the coffee production facility.  I did mention in the previous post about how the actual coffee beans are picked.  It is quite an arduous task and one that I will never take for granted again.  Our hands were covered in a black sticky substance mostly from the honey that surrounds the coffee nut.

Once the red, ripe beans are picked, packed into 100 lb burlap bags and weighed, they are taken to the coffee production facility. The red, ripe beans are separated from any inferior beans (green and not quite ripe).  These inferior beans are not thrown away, but rather graded at a lower level or used locally.  Only the red, ripe bean can be sold through the mission as superior grade coffee.

The freshly sorted beans are put through a machine that churns the beans and removes the red casing.  The casings are used for other purposes - fertilizer, compost and pig food.  The yellow bean is then hand shoveled into large concrete pits.  Men is rubber boots and shovels, run water over the beans and wash them to remove the honey.  The beans are then shoveled down to the next level of concrete pits and the water bath process is repeated two more times!!  Water from the washings is drained down to gardens on the lowest tiered level so nothing is wasted.

After the 3rd wash, the yellow beans and then carried by wheel barrows to large level patios.  Very large patios!  One man will hand rake these beans, first in one direction, then once he reaches the end, turns and rakes in the opposite direction.  The beans are dried by the sun for approximately 3 days.  This one man will walk up and down this field of drying coffee beans for 10 hours a day.

The dried yellow beans are then ready for the next step which removes the yellow casing and leaves the familiar green coffee bean.  I am not quite sure how this process is achieved as we did not help in this step.  The green coffee bean is then roasted and ready for retail sale.

The mission supports over 100 families with their coffee production.  Not only do they supply the families with the coffee seedlings to begin their own coffee plants, but they buy the families coffee beans as better than market price.  The mission discovered that the stability of mission purchasing the coffee provided a better income to the families than falling to the whims of a global demand market place.

If anyone is interested in purchasing San Lucas coffee, please refer to the website on the home page of the blog.