Located close to the Pacific coast, the Sierra Sur is home to the famous Pluma Hidalgo variety. Here Raw Material work with Salomon Garcia and Union San Pedro. They are the most formalised, organised group we work with in Mexico and provide a strong model for other associations. Union San Pedro has built demonstrative fields, alternate cash crops and employment programs for young people as an alternative to urban migration.

Union San Pedro Is an association of eight smaller sub-associations that represent eight communities located around the town of San Pedro El Alto in Oaxaca’s Sierra Sur mountain range. The Sierra Sur lies to the south of Oaxaca city, toward the Pacific Ocean and the southern slopes roll down towards the west coast of the state. Union San Pedro represents around 180 coffee producing families and is coordinated by Salomon Garcia. Salomon is originally from Xanica, one of the eight communities of San Pedro and he helped to establish the association back in the early 2000’s. Along with the original leadership group, Salomon went on to found UNTAO to support the production of San Pedro as the association grew. UNTAO, which stands for Unión Nacional de Trabajadores Agrícolas Oaxaqueños, is the co-operative owned exporter and dry mill that we use to mill our coffees in Oaxaca city.

In the last few years Salomon has returned his focus back to the producers of San Pedro full time to try and tackle some of the issues facing coffee farmers in Oaxaca today. Under Salomon’s leadership the association has funded demonstrative parcela’s or small farms for each sub association to experiment with different varieties and farming techniques to improve the low yields that are common in Oaxaca.  Likewise, the association has built several coffee nurseries to supply its members with high quality seedlings, a real rarity for most producers here.

Most significantly, Salomon has focused Union San Pedro on a concerted program of reforestation and diversification. This has taken the form of ‘bosques comestibles’ or edible forests comprising alternative food crops such as vanilla, cinnamon, cardamom and cacao. As well as improving the health of the land and soil, these crops provide important further revenue streams and capital for Union San Pedro. Many young people are forced to leave the region in search of work and the average age of producers is increasing. Part of the strategy around developing the infrastructure in San Pedro is to provide jobs and opportunities in the nurseries, parcelas and edible forests for the young members, to slow the rate of outward migration.  The average farmer in San Pedro has between 1-4 hectares of land and generally a very small production of coffee like most producers in Oaxaca. This lot comprises coffees from seven producers from three of the sub associations; Los Naranjos, Tierra Blanca and Malvavisco. Coffees are pulped, usually with a hand pulper and fermented in wooden tanks.

The coffee is a mix of two varieties that are very typical to the Sierra Sur, Mundo Novo and Pluma Hidalgo. Pluma Hidalgo is a variant of the Typica variety and was developed in the Sierra Sur, in the town of Pluma Hidalgo just a few miles from San Pedro.