Coffee in Peru: An Important Source of Certified Organic Coffee

Today I thought it might be a good idea to focus our attentions on a country that has one of the highest production levels for certified organic coffee in the world: Peru.

According to Jon Thorn's The Coffee Companion, however, the production standards are not all that they could be. Because of local problems such as drug traffickers, the existence of guerrilla warfare and extremely high inflation, the economic situation is far from stable. Nevertheless, Peru has benefited however from a perception that certain rival countries (such as Columbia) have grown too expensive.

Ninety-eight per cent of Peru's coffee is grown in forested areas, and is mostly farmed by small peasant interests. In the mid-1970s, production was around 900,000 bags per year, and this has increased to an annual output of about 3.5 million bags. Marketing of Peruvian coffee is a government monopoly, but private exporters operate through intermediaries to collect private coffee nationally.

The best coffee originates from the regions of Chanchamayo, Cuzco, Norte and Puno. A large proportion of the coffee is marketed as being organic, but it is not always easy to verify the growing conditions of the coffee trees. Given the fact that the most of the growers consist of indigent farmers who likely cannot afford pesticides or fertilizers, this problem may seem to be a bit of a red herring, but the problem remains nonetheless.

Germany and the United States are the most important markets for Peruvian coffee (as is, I believe, Destination Cafe, the company for which I work) but important customers also exist in Japan, which The Coffee Companion takes as a good indicator of the relative quality of the coffee.