In celebration of Women’s Month
As part of our social and environmental initiatives, this past month we visited Café Tarqui, a specialty coffee association founded by Francy Osorio. Francy is a 39-year-old coffee grower from Huila, single mother of four, an agroforestry engineer and agronomist. She is an empowered, hard-working woman with a big heart, passionate about her work and a local leader. Having worked in the coffee fields with her family from an early age, she is a true example of generational inclusion in her region.
Café Tarqui is made up of 23 women and 25 men coffee producers and oversees their development and well-being while at the same time contributing to the conservation of their environment through different projects. In her own words, Francy states: “We work so that coffee growers have a better life and more benefits. There’s a lot of poverty in this area.”
We visited Francy and the association to conclude the initiative we did in celebration of International Women’s Month, celebrated in March. During our trip, we visited Francy’s farm called “Las Pavas” where we source the coffee “La Magdalena” for our Women in Coffee series. From the sale of this coffee in our NY shops, we were able to donate a percentage to Francy and Café Tarqui. Part of the funds were used to pay Francy’s enrollment in school where she is finishing a Masters in Coffee Science and Technology. The rest were used to purchase beehives to encourage beekeeping in the region. In this way, we can support female heads of households and their contributions to personal and social growth whilst implementing strategies that promote community development and the well-being of the environment.
Several members of the association already have active apiary projects. We got to see first-hand the beekeeping projects that they are carrying out which has different development objectives for the region. These include improving coffee quality, generating profitability through the trade of honey and pollen, and conserving the environment and biodiversity of the region. After carrying out our research and diagnostic of the community’s needs alongside Francy, we chose to raffle off three hives to producer members of Café Tarqui to help them further their efforts.
Additionally, during our trip, our team held a workshop at the local school, Colegio Quituro, on generational inclusion: one of our social initiatives so that youth in the area find sense and meaning in their region so that they can later undertake life projects aimed at the well-being of their community and territory.
At Café Tarqui, we also held another workshop with coffee growers and their families for them to familiarize themselves with the importance of their region. They have a small location used to analyze and cup their coffees where they also hold meetings and workshops on agricultural processes among others. They are constantly fundraising to reach their goals as a group.
