Agroforestry is a relatively new term for a very old agricultural technique that stands today in primary producing countries like Colombia as a trending solution for climate mitigation within the industry after years of misunderstanding it. Back in the early XIX century, shade-grown systems represented the traditional way of growing coffee in Asia and Africa. This tradition was adopted by Latin American coffee producers by the end of the century and beginning of the 20th century, when coffee was gaining in commercial popularity along the region. Nevertheless, while starting the learning process on how to grow better at scale a foreign crop, from which little to none information of its behavior in steeper terrains than those of its origin was available, the planning, selection, establishment, and maintenance of tree species used in these shade systems was done without a rigorous analysis of the effects on the coffee plantation. As a result, the misinterpretation of the intricate and complex relationships (both positive and negative) of trees cohabiting a space with coffee plants showed agroforestry systems to be disadvantageous for coffee productivity, which demoted this farming approach for almost the rest of the century.
During mid 20th century, incentives in productivity were put in place to promote the growth of the agroindustry in developing countries in America, taking advantage of an increasing demand of coffee in northern hemisphere consumer countries. By then, environmental responsibility was not as deeply supported by science as it is today and therefore, it wasn't rooted in the collective consciousness of society back then. Different socioeconomic urges such as the agricultural land scarcity, encouraged global initiatives as the green revolution, which was led by Norman Borlaug and adopted by most of the coffee producing in south and central America, which sought in a group of practices such as the growth of high yield and resistant varieties, the use of synthetic fertilizers, and make use of latest technology, among others, to increase productivity of commercially important crops while keeping the productive area constant together with relative unconsciousness of the planet´s environmental vulnerability, provoked the creation of short-term incentives targeting the maximization of crop yields, which in turn drove the transition of traditional shade grown coffee systems in countries like Colombia towards highly intensive production systems entirely exposed to the sun. This incentivized the unregulated expansion of the agricultural limits among commercially competing rural communities, which employed deforestation, slash-and-burn, and monoculture systems to gain productive advantages in relation to neighboring farms. Years of pursuing a constant increase in volume in the production of coffee has resulted in an environmental down spiral effect that, up to this date, evidence itself as a main cause of deterioration and transformation of precious vulnerable ecosystems in the neotropics. Nowadays, after almost a century of keeping in the shade the agroforestry systems in primary producing countries like Colombia or Brazil, we understand the negative long-term effects of sun-grown coffee; the decrease in local biodiversity, the degradation of the soil´s health due to erosion, organic matter depletion and water scarcity. But also, we fear as other Latin-American origins, that have had shade-grown coffee systems all along, to start an unsustainable transition towards sun-exposed systems as a response to market pressures and a way to have a competitive commercial advantage in the region.
Today, as we celebrate this planet environmental resources, we want to highlight Agroforestry systems as the central axis for sustainable coffee agriculture and the pivot concept where all other smart agricultural practices gain sense as part of an integral strategy to provide prosperity and resilience to farmers. Science provides us today with data on how shade above coffee plantations have a positive impact not only on soil health, organic matter content and water retention potential, but also on the improvement of nutrient cycling among vegetative species, crop microclimate conditions, increase biodiversity and even carbon sequestration schemes. We now understand this “rustic” technique as a land management system that preserves in the long-term the productivity potential of soils by facilitating positive interactions among coffee plants and a variety of tree species, that when correctly selected and established, provide an almost limitless array of benefits to overcome slight decreases in short-term productivity. Indeed, the planet´s resources increasing risk of depletion, together with increasing consumer demands, which spark more strict regulations of exports to top consumer countries, calls for action among national policy makers and coffee industry players at origin/producing countries, to properly encourage a sustainable development at producing farms aligned with international efforts to preserve the planet´s biosphere.
Caravela's efforts to achieve net zero for its coffee trading operation spins around the creation of a complete support ecosystem for producers in Latin-America, where agroforestry represents a key lever to promote the transition towards a more sustainable development among coffee growers. First, our technical team of PECA is constantly learning, training, and improving their conceptual know-how and state-of-the-art field practices to provide farmers with a unique learning ecosystem where they grow their understanding of climate change, its effects and how to adapt to them. But also, we want to work closely with other players along the supply chain and build alliances that, besides opening new markets for producers, allow the integration and enhancement of smart farming mitigation and compensation strategies such as pulp management, wastewater treatment infrastructure, optimal fertilizers usage, and in-setting endeavors that through restauration of fragile ecosystems or the preservation of the soil health, open new economic opportunities for farmers as the sequester carbon thanks to their complete behavioral change. Therefore, agroforestry systems, in close integration with other smart farming techniques and social initiatives, becomes a land management system that protects and preserves within its shade not only the coffee plantation and its soil, but also the commercial future and prosperity of producer families around the world, and the vulnerable biotic and abiotic resources that we are celebrating together today.