Paraná | Brazil

Juarez Colatino Barros is part of the COANOP Cooperative of smallholder farmers.

Here is Juarez’s story in his own words:

“My name is Juarez Colatino Barros, I grew up helping my parents Noel and Maria Barros in the coffee field. At the age of 12 I remember waking up very early to help them on the coffee harvest.

After a long period working for other farmers, finally in 1999 I was able to buy my small piece of land, the Sítio Boa Vista, and planted 3 hectares of coffee.

Quick Facts

Producer:
Juarez Colatino Barros

Farm:
Sítio Boa Vista

Region:
São Jerônimo da Serra, Norte Pioneiro, Paraná

Varieties:
IPR 107

Processing:
Natural process. Hand-picked and dried on African beds for 21 days.

Cup Profile
Grape, tropical fruits, herbal, delicate, creamy body, clean and sweet finish

Those were very difficult times and we were practically working to survive, we did not have good prospects for the future. At that time we focused only on quantity, and were not so concerned with quality.

Our vision began to change in 2011, when José Antônio (Bispo from Capricornio) started to give us technical assistance, doing full monitoring of crops and mainly showing us the quality potential we had in our hands and we were not using. So we started to follow the recommendations and changed the way to produce our coffee, applying new harvest and post-harvest practices and from that point on we started to produce special coffees. But the main change came in 2015, when we managed, through Capricórnio Coffees, to have access to the high value-added coffee market viable, thus closing the last link we needed to make our coffee growing sustainable. With the prospect of harvesting 250 bags in the 7 hectare area, I see that I have the potential to do 40% of this in high quality coffees. But this was only possible because Capricornio helped us to think differently and today I see that the one who keeps thinking only in quantity, without quality will be left behind.”