Don Leopolo (Polo) Euceda
El Tamarindo

We first met Don Polo ten years ago when there was a wave of enthusiasm on his part of the mountain for the organic coffee co-op COFEACOMA. We brought a bunch of folks from Wisconsin to visit the farmers of El Tamarindo and other farmers walked in from El Sute and El Horno. There were meetings and visits to coffee farms. From that group of farmers in El Tamarindo, only Don Polo is left. The organic coffee route is not easy.

The COFEACOMA co-op dreams of sending hundreds of thousands of pounds of coffee at a high price that cuts out the middle buyers, but for that to happen people in the U.S.A. and other places need to buy directly from them. For that to happen, the farmers need to maintain a high level of quality. The co-op has been on a road that has taken them to higher and higher quality. Don Polo's patience will hopefully pay off in the coming years. Each year the farmers compete to see who can get the best cupping score. The farmers know that many factors can reduce their score and affect the whole group. Don Polo has not sent much coffee for the last few years.

When I saw him in 2019 I asked how things were going. He said that the "broca" had affected his crop. The broca is an insect that lays its eggs in a developing coffee bean. The egg hatches and the larva lives inside the coffee bean, emerging eventually to fly around and mate and lay eggs in more coffee beans. This is a hard pest to control, even for conventional farmers. It is one reason that arabica coffee is grown high in the mountains, because the cooler temps mean fewer generations of broca in a given year. But climate change is changing the growing conditions in El Tamarindo. In 2018 there was an intense drought and the heat that went with the drought made things worse. With the drought the size of the beans dropped. You could pick all day and only make half the weight you would in a normal year. With the heat, the broca increased, so the small beans you do get are often damaged. In 2019, the global price for coffee did not care about a drought and broca problem in El Tamarindo. It was as low as it was 10 years ago. Don Polo and his family hand-pick through the beans they send to Farmer to Farmer, in order to only send quality. There is a point where it is diminishing returns for them, but Don Polo is in it for the long haul, knowing that over time maintaining quality will pay off.

Growing coffee is a way for farmers like Don Polo to improve the future for their families. In good years, when the price is up, farmers can make a lot of money. This pumps money into their communities. People buy building supplies and motorcycles and pay for the costs of educating their children in the city. Don Polo's son Orlin has received higher education and works in the city. The photo is from a time when Don Polo met us on the road to El Sute. He and Orlin brought coffee to us and were waiting at the turn off to El Tamarindo. Cheers to Leopolo Euceda!