Catracha Coffee Launches Quality Project
Social Enterprise Keeping Focus on Farmers and Quality
Catracha Coffee, a coffee-buying social enterprise that accesses the specialty coffee market for smallholder farmers, announced today the launch of the Catracha Quality Project (CQP). The CQP is a quality initiative focused on supporting the production of specialty coffee among Catracha Coffee farmers in Honduras. This project will introduce data collection practices to farmers with the goal of gaining deeper insight into opportunities to maximize quality during coffee processing. “There are more than 400 small coffee producers in Santa Elena and our dream is for each of them to be involved in a shared capacity to produce great coffee,” said Mayra Orellana-Powell, founder of Catracha Coffee.
Catracha Coffee and its farmers will map the post-harvest process and collect data at each step, from receiving, pulping, fermenting, drying, and storage. “Many farmers have their particular way of doing things, and our goal is to capture the uniqueness from farm to farm so we can learn from each other and get even better,” said Orellana-Powell. Implementation of this project will begin in November for the 2014-2015 harvest, with three farmers engaged during the initial phase.
Catracha Coffee invites the coffee community to take part in the CQP and support the advancement of specialty coffee. “Catracha would not exist without support from the specialty coffee community,” said Orellana-Powell. “Their continued commitment gives Catracha farmers a sense of pride and inspires all of us to work even harder to produce great coffee.” Individuals and organizations interested in project team involvement, sponsorship, or updates are encouraged to send inquiries to quality@catrachacoffee.com. Catracha Coffee will also be launching a crowdfunding campaign to support project and equipment costs.
About Catracha Coffee
Catracha Coffee is a social enterprise that purchases coffee from smallholder farmers in Santa Elena, Honduras, and sells that coffee to the specialty market. Profits from the sale of green coffee are then returned to the farmers. The focus is twofold – to grow farmer earnings through capacity building, and to promote prosperity. In July 2013, Catracha returned more than $30,000 to farmers through its profit sharing program.
Catracha Coffee was established in 2011 by Mayra Orellana-Powell. Mayra’s dream was to positively impact her hometown of Santa Elena, Honduras, where her family has harvested coffee on family farms for generations. Catracha Coffee currently works with over 30 smallholder farmers. To learn more, please visit: http://www.
