In the Sierra Mazateca region of Oaxaca, Mexico, small-scale coffee producers face low yields and challenges of under-development, yet produce high-quality coffees.

A novel approach by Raw Material and Red Beetle involves re-processing discarded beans from colour sorters in dry mills, separating quality beans that would have otherwise been sold at sub-commercial prices on the internal market. The result is surprisingly tasty! And even better yet, returns speciality grade pricing to the producers where it has maximum impact.

The return of Electrónicas this year finds a story of value-recovery at every step of the chain...

The Story

Electrónicas very nearly didn't happen this year - a crucial error was made in the mill. We found on landing, the coffee was presenting with a lot of (very sweet) but clearly process-forward flavours, and we found the odd cherry pod (a natural that escaped the milling process). An investigation was run up the chain, whilst we ran a lot from SIPRO in its place. As buyers - we could have rejected the coffee. Not our problem, someone else can handle it and eat the loss.

But that is completely at odds with the entire point of Electrónicas - salvaging something brilliant from a product that would have been otherwise significantly discounted and practically discarded. We put our labour where our mouth is and we've been hand sorting through each batch of green coffee; in addition to our usual post-roast hand sort (removing quakers). It's a humbling exercise - we expect nothing but a perfect sort on each coffee we buy, as an industry - it's good to be reminded of the work it takes to achieve that result.
But what a result - we usually prefer a clean washed lot for house filter, but we're intrigued at how chocolate-forward this lot has become. Possibly one of the most chocolatey coffees we've ever roasted.
We're liking it so much, we may even request it comes like this next year (with the optical sorting a bit more tweaked for the green profile of naturals...)

Electrónicas 2024 Information:

The Mazateca region, located in Oaxaca, Mexico, is known for its cultural and biological diversity. Home to the indigenous Mazatec people, it's a mountainous area characterised by mesophile forests, constant rain, and mist. Despite a rich indigenous heritage, the long term effects of a history of colonialism in Central America has left the region facing significant challenges in under-development.

A key feature of the Mazateca is its tradition of coffee growing. The terrain's steepness makes farming difficult, but it contributes to the high quality of coffee produced. However, for a long time, these unique coffees were lost in large regional/commercial blends. By cupping small lots individually, various qualities and flavour profiles are identified, improving the economic return of value for local producers.

The region struggles with low coffee prices, coffee leaf rust, and ageing plants, leading to low yields and an increase in migration, especially among the young. This leaves the labour-intensive coffee work to older producers. The main coffee varieties are Typica, Mundo Novo, and Caturra, often over 40 years old and un-pruned/un-stumped, contributing to low yields.

The average coffee producer in the Mazateca owns less than a hectare, leading to small-scale production. Owing to the conditions in the field, the majority of yields for these farmers are incredibly low - even as small as below a single sack of exportable green coffee. 

For contrast, a recent lot we picked up for Facility Blend saw a Guatemalan smallholder produce over 1300kg (20 x 69kg) of green coffee from a 0.7HA plot, a 10 fold difference. The region's remoteness and challenging conditions have led to it being neglected, even within the coffee industry. Despite this, the Mazateca produces some of the most complex and high-quality coffees in Mexico, once the effort is made to cup, separate nano-lots, and produce smaller scale focused field blends

Efforts are being made to integrate Mazateca producers into the specialty coffee market, aiming to create a sustainable and profitable supply chain. This initiative seeks to improve yields, volumes, and quality of coffee production in the region, offering a viable alternative to selling to local intermediaries at market prices. One crucial step in the final export process is running the milled coffee through an optical colour-sorter. 

This machine uses tiny cameras and puffs of compressed air to remove any out-of-spec green beans - physical defects, foreign matter - at a tremendous rate, replacing the work of hand-sorting through individual lots before bagging. But, to quote an old legend of my coffee youth - “there are many more ugly beans than there are defects”. When it comes to the small scale yields, the discard pile from the colour sorter can represent a significant fraction of a producer’s work. Traditionally, this coffee is sold on the internal market for a fraction of the price achieved for the speciality export-grade lot. 

Raw Material, on a mission to maximise producer income - alongside export partner Red Beetle coffee - have come up with a pretty ingenious method where the discard pile from the colour sorter (containing the defective beans we don’t want, ugly beans we don’t mind, and erroneously rejected good beans) is run through the machinery again on a tighter tolerance - rejecting the vast majority, but separating out that which shouldn’t have been removed in the first place.

The result is surprisingly tasty! And even better yet, returns speciality grade pricing to the producers where it has maximum impact.