The Untapped Coffee of Bolivia

The rich rugged mountains, high altitudes, beautiful communities, and winding roads of Bolivia make it a complex and underexplored coffee origin. Bolivia is an untapped resource for excellent quality coffee in South America and may not be as explored as its neighboring countries. Its history with the crop is complex and intertwined with many challenges. Today, there are a number of exporting groups working to deliver the exceptional coffee from its soil to roasters throughout the world.

Like most coffee-producing countries, coffee was introduced to Bolivia by the Spanish, since the small country was once a colony of Spain from the 1500s through the mid-1800s. Coffee was initially planted in the Yungas region, where the climbing Andes mountains meet the lush Amazon rainforest. It is here where the climate is subtropical, making it a prime area for coffee production, supported by high biodiversity. Thanks to the climate, altitude, and diverse ecosystems, this region is characterized by healthy soils for other agricultural products including the controversial crop, Coca.

The indigenous peoples of Bolivia were the ones responsible for planting and cultivating the crops where coffee thrived. Coffee exports were quite small from the early 1800s through the 1900s, and most of the coffee was consumed by the wealthier classes of Bolivia. After gaining independence in 1825, Bolivia began building its own infrastructure to grow and export coffee, which started out to be a challenge.

It was not until the mid-1900s that coffee production gained stability thanks to agricultural reforms that took off in 1953. This allowed the indigenous peoples of Bolivia to take ownership of land and grow crops for economic revenue. In the 1960s, the Caranavi Province within the Yungas region, was offered to the indigenous groups to grow coffee. Today, it is the leading producer of coffee in Bolivia.

These smallholder groups began creating cooperatives and supportive coalitions to assist with coffee production and export. This included the ANPROCA (National Coffee Producers Association) which was initiated in 1976 and the FECAFEB (Federation of Coffee Exporters of Bolivia), launching in 1991. As coffee production grew, more attention was soon paid to quality, and producers were beginning to learn how to grow higher quality beans to earn a higher income.

Cup of Excellence took place in Bolivia from 2004 through 2009, opening up opportunities for producers, which shined light on the country as an excellent coffee producing origin. In 2014, the Taza Presidencial was held to recognize the best lots Bolivia had produced that year, which concluded with an auction. These competitions were all excellent opportunities for Bolivia to show the world its high-quality coffee.

The Yungas region is responsible for 95% of coffee production in Bolivia, primarily from smallholder producers, on farms ranging in size from one to eight hectares. The country is the 38^th largest producer of coffee in the world, so it is still a bit low on the production side.

However, coffee production also dropped in the early 2000s, which has been caused by a number of factors. One of which was infrastructure – Bolivia is a mountainous country that is landlocked, making it challenging to transport and export coffee from the producing areas. Additionally, the appeal of Coca discouraged farmers from growing coffee because it was an easier and more profitable crop. So, coffee production has been unstable in Bolivia, requiring some external help and support to boost the industry.

Mercanta recently began working with Atoq Coffee in Bolivia, founded by Matteo Bertoletti in 2019. His work in coffee started in Italy, where his brother was importing coffee. It was here he learned that Bolivian coffee was not too well known in the importing industry. Matteo grew up in Bolivia but studied in Italy, thus he was inspired to find a way to bring Bolivian coffee to the world.

Matteo returned home and began working with producers in Cochabamba, near his home of San José, to teach producers about how to grow high quality coffee. At this time, Bolivian coffee consumption was beginning to increase, and coffee was gaining some recognition as an important crop in the country. Yet, the pandemic hit, and Matteo’s work was somewhat halted. He delved into research and communication with the local producers to understand how they could improve. “The vast increase in coffee shops and roasteries around major cities motivated many producers to keep going with coffee or even switch their other crops to coffee,” mentions Matteo.

Thanks to his connection with an Italian coffee importer, he was able to maintain his work and build a community of producers to export coffee worldwide. “Bolivian coffee started to be perceived as very attractive and exotic for certain markets, pushing quality to increase,” adds Matteo. He also notes that “coffee is now being seen as a national pride,” in Bolivia.

Cochabamba is not a well-known producing area for coffee in Bolivia, so Matteo had a challenge to promote and develop this area close to his home. Coffee production started here in 2012 as part of a local government program, yet coffee leaf rust devastated the crops, pushing farmers to look elsewhere for income.

Matteo has worked with over 200 coffee-producing families with farms ranging in size from 0.5 to one hectare. “All these years, working with coffee, even on a relatively small scale, has given me all the tools and knowledge to really understand the product – from cultivation to processing, from analyzing the green bean to roasting and cupping” mentions Matteo.

So, Matteo sought to revitalize coffee production in his home region to bring more income to these parts of Bolivia and export some excellent quality coffee to the rest of the world. Yet Cochabamba is characterized by tumultuous terrain, making it difficult to access and deliver coffee to the wet mill he opened in Cochabamba.

Another hurdle is communication – language amongst the locals of Cochabamba is not Spanish but Quechua, so it adds another layer of complexity to sourcing coffee from here. Matteo feels this is another way to connect to the community, and to teach the locals about not only coffee but the cities in Bolivia that few have seen since they rarely leave their villages.

Bolivia, as a whole country, is not without its own problems. Politically, the country is experiencing struggles with the Boliviano, the local currency, due to the poor exchange rate, making trade difficult and leading to issues with imports and fuel prices. Bolivia relies heavily on imports and after the poorly managed export of natural gas, this led to the loss of dollars, and the reduction of the Boliviano. The cost of basic necessities has increased significantly, and people are beginning to drive less, making it more difficult to move coffee. Additionally, all imports have been affected, including fertilizer, due to inflation, stressing Bolivians involved with agriculture since input costs are rising.

Matteo and his team are working diligently to overcome these issues. “Our only real solution to mitigate crises and situations like the ones we are facing today is to keep expanding production,” says Matteo. He has plans to open his own dry mill with one producer, Edwin Huanca, someone who is deeply rooted in the coffee community. And thanks to connections with Mercanta, they are able to reach new markets in countries such as the UK, Singapore, and various cities in Europe. Soon Matteo’s coffee will be available in these places including the US. Reach out to learn how you can support Atoq and the amazing producers of Bolivia.