PRODUCER: Smallholders in Popayán, Colombia
EXPORTER: Cofinet
SAILING CARGO VESSEL: Ide Min
LOADING PORT: Santa Marta. Colombia - May 2024
DELIVERY PORT: Plymouth, UK - June / July 2024
NAUTICAL MILES: over 4,300 nm

Cofinet collaborates with approximately 65 growers who contribute to their program and with whom they build long-term relationships. This program encourages farmers to focus on quality and based on quality assessment, they provide up to 20% premiums above the market price.

Popayán is located in the Cauca department of Colombia, at an altitude of 1,500 - 2,070 meters above sea level. The Meseta de Popayán is sheltered by the Andes Mountains, which helps to create a uniform climate and altitude. This coffee is a mix of Colombia, Castillo and Caturra varieties, which undergo a typical washed process where cherries are floated and sorted before being pulped and washed to remove all the cherry and mucilage. Parchments of coffee are then placed on patios to dry over 20+ days.

After this first washed process, the milled coffee is delivered to Descafecol in Manizales for decaffeination using the sugar cane process. The green coffee beans are put into a steam chamber where their silver skin is removed and submerged in spring water. As soon as the coffee is saturated with water, it is sent to the extractors where the beans have direct contact with ethyl acetate – a natural byproduct created from sugar cane refining – for eight hours, dissolving the caffeine content. After this, the then-decaffeinated coffee is dried in a chamber to reach the same moisture content which it had before the process.

The ethyl acetate can be reused several times before it is sent on for refinement, and the resulting caffeine is then dried and sold to other industries such as pharmaceuticals and energy drinks manufacturers.

This process avoids excessive temperatures seen in other decaffeination processes and leaves a coffee with enhanced sweetness which roasts and tastes much more like the original, caffeinated coffee. The big advantage of this process, outside of the flavour profile, is that it was developed and is completed in Colombia. This allows for progression through the supply chain without the extra costs and shipping miles to decaffeination plants in Mexico, Canada or Germany, and the profits stay within the country of origin.

Score: +84

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We post orders weekly with Royal Mail within the UK only. Expect delivery between 5-7 days. Do contact us via the form below if you have a special request.