The new Nicaragua

Just when the boutique coffee market was booming in the United States in the 1980-90's, the US government imposed an embargo on the Sandinista regime in Nicaragua, so Nicaraguan coffee would not appear on the display shelves of American coffee shops. Because of this, the average American consumer is less familiar with Nicaraguan coffee, but even though the average consumer is very strange to Nicaraguan coffee. But buyers in the industry are no stranger to Nigeria's high-quality boutique beans (especially Bourbon and Typica, two old trees). Nicaraguan coffee usually grows in dense shade, 3500-5000 feet above sea level, around fertile volcanic zones.

Unfortunately, even regular buyers of Nicaraguan beans sometimes shake their heads at their ups and downs, which is caused by not only natural climate problems, but also political unrest and frequent civil strife. Nicaragua, for example, was hit by Hurricane Mitch, the worst cyclone in Central America, in the 1990s, which left the country's suburbs sad and forced tens of thousands of coffee farmers and farm workers to change jobs. Five years after the storm, Nigeria's coffee industry has not returned to its previous size.

But today, Nicaragua has finally returned to the boutique coffee market, and many roasters now gradually regard Nicaraguan beans as a unique coffee producing area. These buyers' impression of Nepalese coffee has changed greatly, from using it as a matching bean to using it as a high-quality single bean, which shows that the quality of Nepalese coffee has improved a lot. As a matter of fact, recently, many buyers from the United States, Europe and Japan have often visited the origin of Nicaragua, which can be said to be a Phoenix flying on the branches.

In February this year, I joined a delegation of Nicaraguan coffee buyers. Over the past nine years, I occasionally visited the coffee producing areas of Nicaragua, but this time, I felt the sinister impact that the Nicaraguan coffee industry was facing. The persistently depressed coffee prices have a serious impact on the Nepalese economy. But even with such obstacles, people in this place are still optimistic and innovating, and people in Nicaragua are constantly trying to introduce a new model of the coffee industry in an attempt to recover from the recession. Perhaps because Nicaragua has faced a variety of crises over the past few years, their attitude towards crisis management can help them turn the crisis into a turning point.

The crisis of the coffee industry

For Nicaragua, the overall coffee industry is depressed, which has a great impact on the country. In Nicaragua, the coffee industry provides 200000 of the country's jobs, and coffee beans are the country's most economically valuable crop, accounting for 20% of the country's total exports. The low price of coffee season has hit all the countries that produce washed Arabica beans, but the pain seems to be even more amplified in Nigeria, where many diversified coffee producers, such as Costa Rica, make up for the losses suffered by the coffee industry with revenues from other industries, such as self-help tourism or multinationals (such as Intel's presence in Costa Rica).

But Nepal is not so lucky. Apart from the coffee industry, they have no other industries to make up for the losses. The Deputy Minister of Agriculture of Nicaragua said: "the low price of coffee during this year's coffee season has reduced the overall revenue of coffee farmers in our country by US $1 million. This has a direct impact on the livelihood of about 30, 000 coffee farmers, especially the people in the growing areas. "

The economic and social chaos in Nepal has affected hundreds of thousands of people, whether it is unemployment, the decline in the number of immigrants, and national health problems. According to a study provided by the Santa Cruz division of the university of California, the rate of malnutrition among children in coffee-producing areas in Nicaragua is 21%, compared with 9% in the country as a whole. Mike Maxey, district director of Nicaragua at USAID, said: "when we say coffee farmers are in crisis, we don't necessarily mean that they may be in danger of breaking up their families. We mean that they may starve, and about 70% of the people living in Nicaraguan coffee-producing areas spend less than $2 a day. "

Chris Bacon, a graduate student at the University of California, Santa Cruz, added: "the low price of coffee futures caused a very dramatic impact. The proceeds from selling coffee gave people in the producing areas the money to buy food, shoes, and notebooks for school children. This impact caused a very big crisis for temporary workers and regular farm employees. In the Matagalpa area alone, 20 of the existing 25 coffee farms were forced to close down." "

According to government statistics, the total number of workers on coffee farms is about 150000, but 80% of them are now unemployed. They have no land or income, and are eventually forced to move from the suburbs to downtown slums. Some even go to the United States to work for a living.

Over the next few years, the U.S. government and other regional development units plan to fund more plans to revive the coffee industry in Nicaragua. Bendanya, deputy minister of agriculture, and Maxey, regional director of Nicaragua, USAID, said in unison: "the solution to Nicaragua's economic problems must be long-term planning and target enterprise solutions." And existing boutique coffee facilities (such as cup testing laboratories, online bidding activities, cooperative-run water treatment plants, and other quality improvement organizations) and, more importantly, a rapid increase in the number of local coffee farmers involved in the project.

Crisis or turning point

Researcher Bacon found that the current crisis in the coffee industry in Nicaragua has mostly caused coffee farmers to reflect on the shortcomings of the original mode of production. "sometimes the crisis can divide people, but sometimes it can also unite people," he said. Many Nicaraguan coffee farmers find that they can survive if they join cooperatives, organic certification schemes, or fair trade associations. "

In a survey of 240small coffee farms in the Matagalpa-Jinotega district, Bacon and other researchers found that coffee farmers who joined organic certification programs or fair trade associations earned about 2-3 times higher than those in the country. Bacon further pointed out: "these farmers show a higher level of self-confidence than other farmers and believe that they do not have to worry about bank deductions. "

Bacon said that the impact has caused great damage to large farms, and in this limited small market, the small farm model seems to reflect the trend of future farms. Large farms usually have a high debt-offset ratio for banks, which is a high-income-high-expenditure business model, which is difficult to achieve in modern times. because the trend of modern coffee farms is high planting costs and high labor costs, capital recovery is not easy. "

As a result, small farms have more room for survival because they only use the original limited manpower and grow them organically. In addition, they also grow crops for daily needs. Small cooperative farms feel that their business model is recognized by more buyers. More importantly, small coffee farms find that their lives are changing, not only with higher incomes. They also agree with the benefits brought to them by participating in a large group, and the power of this large group is amazing.