Organic Coffee, Part 1: The magic of soil

The world’s farming soils are deteriorating quickly.

Conventional coffee farming where plants are grown using agrochemicals allowed farmers to reap huge harvests these last 70 years. But these agrochemicals have been at the expense of soil health.

I travel to Honduras to explore a potential solution: organic coffee farming.

Come with me as I show you the organic farming tricks of Don Rufino, one of the region’s leading organic farmers.

He nurtures the soil around his coffee trees using mountain microorganisms, a huge diversity of shade trees, attentive tree pruning, and very funky batches of homemade bug spray.

The results speak for themselves: when I pick up a handful of his soil, it is moist, dense and writhing with life.

Could these cultivation techniques be the answer to the coffee world’s declining soil health?


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Dive deeper into organic coffee

Explore Sustainable Harvest’s range of certified organic and Fairtrade coffees
Are you a coffee farmer? Get in touch with Lalo Perez Varaona
Check out Don Rufino’s organic cooperative, RAOS


Connect with my very knowledgeable guests

Lalo Perez Varaona - LinkedIn
Tommie Hooft van Huysduynen - LinkedIn
Alison Streaker - LinkedIn


The Science of Coffee is made possible by these leading coffee organisations

BWT Water and More
Marco Beverage Systems
ROEST
Sustainable Harvest
Mahlkönig


The Science of Coffee is a spin-off series from James Harper's documentary podcast Filter Stories