Executive Summary

In 2022, Bean Voyage launched a 12-month market readiness initiative to support 50 women coffee farmers in Veracruz, Mexico. We have been developing a go-to-market strategy for smallholder women farmers in the region with the possibility of building a tailored market program in the following year that can then be expanded to other regions in Mexico such as Chiapas and Oaxaca. 

The Market Readiness Program consisted of a series of consultations on harvest and post-harvest practices that smallholder women can implement to improve and maintain the quality of their coffee so that they can fetch higher prices in the international market. 

For this year’s harvest, we are working with two buyers and importers, Falcon Coffee (the UK) and Fritz Coffee Company (South Korea).

Due to the impact of climate change and limited access to resources, the productivity of the recruited farms was negatively impacted, and we had less coffee available in the short term than estimated for the market. Nonetheless, we are hopeful that the productivity will bounce back in the two-year timeline as producers implement good farming practices shared at the workshop. 

As a result of this project, we generated a direct income of USD43,564.61 for the 50 partner farmers and their families. On average, producers earned USD 8.77 per kg of green coffee (and $3.99 per lb of green coffee), which is 86% higher than the current market price (C-market) due to differentiated quality and market and improved supply chain (market price of green coffee is USD 2.14 per lb of green as of August 21, 2022).

50

total number of families