In November, I was invited by PromPeru to attend FiCafe coffee expo in Puno. I flew into Lima, before flying up to Juliaca, and driving 2 hours to Puno. Puno is situation 4000 meters above sea level, and I certainly felt the affects of the altitude as soon as I arrived. The group was made up of 30+ people from 13 countries, and while I didn’t know anyone going into the trip, I met lots of great people on the first day.
Day One: We visited a local mill called Cecovasa which processes around 19T of parchment a day from 7 local cooperatives. They also roast ‘espresso dark roast’ for local supply (around 13T/year).
Day Two: We participated in a cupping session with producer associations from 12 regions: Amazonas, Apurimac, Ayacucho, Cajamarca, Cusco, Huanuco, Junin, Lima, Pasco, Piura, Puno, and San Martin. That night we attended a welcome dinner hosted by the Governor of Puno.
Day Three: We had the business round with representatives from 61 companies and producer associations from the 12 regions participated in the round. There were 441 business meetings with coffee buyers from Germany, Argentina, Australia, Chile, South Korea, the United Arab Emirates, the United States, Italy, New Zealand, the Netherlands, the United Kingdom, Sweden, and Taiwan. I had 18 meetings over 9 hours, thankfully a translator helped out. It was amazing to meet so many producers and cooperative representatives.
Day Four: Travel day from Puno, to Lima, before boarding a flight to Ayacucho.
Day Five: We drove from Ayacucho further north into VREAM (Valley of the ApurÃmac, Ene and Mantaro rivers) which took around 6 hours. The drive was pretty treacherous with very windy roads high up in the mountains. We arrived in Pinchari around 7pm and were very ready for bed!
Day Six: Started early as we had a busy day ahead visiting cooperatives and farms. First stop was to Sivia to visit a cooperative called Quinoaco, which was founded in 1970. Their warehouses were taken over by the military for the 1980’s due to issues in the area, before starting back in 1993. Their mix is currently 80% cacao and 20% coffee, due to a Roya outbreak in the coffee farms a few years back. We cupped some coffee with the team, before getting back in the car to go further into the jungle to a farm.