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Karst Organics Coffee

@karstorganics

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Origin based importer/exporter, shortening the supply chain between the coffee farmers of Timor-Leste and speciality roasters in 🇬🇧🇪🇺@KarstOrganics

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30 tonnes of fully washed parchment: every bag checked for quality and every bag purchased from partner farmers at farmgate.

Whilst we haven’t been able to meet pre-harvest targets, this year’s much lower yield in Letefoho has made us realise that you can only work with what Mother Nature provides. Our export volume is down approximately 20% so a huge thank you to our partner roasters for your understanding if we haven’t been able to meet the full-quantity of your order.

Hopefully you’ll agree that whilst you can’t always get what you want, if you try sometimes, you’ll get what you need and this year’s lots are tasting great!#timorleste #specialitycoffee #coffeeexport #transparency #atorigin taken in Timor-Leste by @karstorganics

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3 days ago

And that’s a wrap!

On Wednesday this week we weighed our final partner farmers parchment, Maun Hermenzildo from the Eratoi group (1,800 masl). This has been our longest season to date with cherry purchase starting on June 15th and final parchment purchase on October 7th: a total of 17.5 weeks.

Photo 1: Hermenzildo, Pedro and Kar-Yee weighing parchment. Each sack weighs 20kg.

Photo 2: Before weighing, the parchment is put into new sacks…

Photo 3: …and every sack is checked carefully for moisture.

Photo 4: A parchment moisture content of approx 9% translates to green bean moisture of approx 10% with water activity approx aW0.57.

Photo 5: A final count up of total volume and time to write Hermenzildo’s receipt.

Photo 6: Hermenzildo’s total volume for this year was 479kg.

Photo 7: With the harvest over, time for smiles and appreciation of a job well done. #timorleste #specialitycoffee #atorigin #transparency #farmerfocussed taken in Letefoho by @karstorganics

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10 days ago

Even though this years harvest has finished for some of our partner farmers, that doesn’t mean they can rest on their laurels.

Coffee tree rehabilitation and maintenance continues to be a priority for us in Letefoho. This years lower yield is a stark reminder that the coffee sector needs to be conscientious and continue supporting producers with rehabilitation activities to ensure increased yields which will only benefit all actors in the supply chain going forward.

#timorleste #specialitycoffee #coffeetreerehabilitation #coffeeforests #atorigin taken in Letefoho by @karstorganics

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17 days ago

In the final installment of our ‘meet the farmer’ series, Arlindo and I sit down to discuss why he prefers to process parchment rather than sell cherry and we also find out how much speciality parchment he processed during this year’s coffee harvest.

As we hear in the video, Arlindo processed 778 kilos of parchment which required him to pick approximately 3,890 kilos of cherry (FYI, Arlindo’s coffee forest is approximately 1.5 hectares). We paid $4.25 per kilo for Arlindo’s coffee earning him $3,890. Whilst this might not seem like a great deal of money, it is comfortably above the national minimum wage of $1,380 per annum ($115 per month). The national minimum wage is one of the few barometers we have to measure household income in Timor-Leste and helps us to understand a little more about the challenging economic climate.

Whilst there is still a long way to go and lots of work to be done, dedicated farmers such as Arlindo are a great example of how speciality coffee has the potential to offer a realistic income in a country where unemployment is high and work hard to come by.

A big thank you to Arlindo for allowing us to film and sharing so much info during this year’s harvest.

#timorleste #specialitycoffee #singleorigin #transparency #meetthefarmer taken in Letefoho by @karstorganics

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a month ago

Even though it’s early September, some of our partner farmers located at higher altitudes here in Letefoho are still harvesting and processing their cherries.

Hermenzildo de Deus (seen here in this video) lives at 1,800 masl and at this altitude, the climate is a lot cooler which means cherries need a little longer to ripen. As you can see, he waits until the cherries are a beautiful, deep red before harvesting so that the fruits’ sweetness will be retained in the cup.

This year’s harvest has been a little longer than we have experienced in the past so with this in mind, we may not be shipping quite as early as we normally do. That said, we still anticipate that providing the shipping gods are are on our side, this year’s lots will land in the UK/Europe early 2027.

#timorleste #specialitycoffee #singleorigincoffee #transparency #eratoi taken in Timor-Leste by @karstorganics

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2 months ago

In our fifth installment of our ‘meet the farmer’ series, Arlindo is ready to wash the coffee seeds that he has been fermenting for 40 hours.

The fermentation process has helped to break down the sticky mucilage covering the coffee seeds and the washing stage is important to remove any remaining residue. As you’ll see, this is a labour intensive process and requires Arlindo to ‘wash’ his coffee around 5 times.

Once washed, the parchment is placed onto a drying rack where it will be dried for 3 days allowing excess water to drain and defect beans to be removed. After this, the parchment will be moved to a tarpaulin where here it will continue to dry for a further 4 days until it reaches a moisture content of 10-11%.

#timorleste #specialitycoffee #singleorigincoffee #transparency #meetthefarmer taken in Letefoho by @karstorganics

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2 months ago

Adao & Francisca Maia de Deus drying their parchment next to their 2 hectare coffee forest in Eratoi, Letefoho, Timor-Leste. 🇹🇱 #timorleste #specialitycoffee #singleorigin #farmerfocussed #transparency taken in Letefoho by @karstorganics

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2 months ago

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2 months ago

In our fourth installment of our ‘meet the farmer’ series, Arlindo explains about the preparation needed prior to the pulping of his cherries: sieving and floating.

All of our partner farmers prefer to use a traditional pulping machine such as the one that Arlindo uses in this video. Although pulping in this way is time consuming, these machines are often more effective at removing cherry skin than modern motorised alternatives and they are certainly kinder to the environment.

People often ask, why don’t the farmers here in Letefoho put a small motor on the crank to save time and energy when pulping? Whilst this would certainly speed things up, communities here are concerned about noise pollution and its impact on Mother Nature. Also, smallholder farmers live in relatively close proximity to one another, so being respectful to your neighbour and having as low an impact as possible when processing are genuine considerations.

#timorleste #specialitycoffee #singleorigincoffee #transparency #meetthefarmer taken in Letefoho by @karstorganics

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2 months ago

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2 months ago

In the third instalment of our ‘meet the farmer’ series, we visit Arlindo as he starts to harvest his cherries which are now ripe for the picking.
As you’ll see, this is an incredibly lengthy and labour intensive process requiring a huge amount of physical stamina and patience.
This process will require three harvests - over a 6-8 week period - which is necessary due to cherries ripening at different times.

#timorleste #specialtycoffee #singleorigincoffee #transparency #meetthefarmer taken in Letefoho by @karstorganics

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3 months ago

Maun Carlito & Mana Dalundas Maria from Goulala, Letefoho, Timor-Leste. 🇹🇱

If you’ve ever tried our washed coffee from Eratoi, then this is where it all begins. #timorleste #specialitycoffee #singleorigin #farmerfocussed #transparency by @karstorganics

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3 months ago