Finca Santa Helena - Colombia

Finca Santa Helena was purchased by Juan Pablo Penagos in 2013. The farm is small, at only 2 hectares, but well-situated at just over 1,660. However, the farm’s natural potential had not been reached. The finca had been abandoned, due to the previous owner’s health issues, and was in quite a state when Juan Pablo took it over. Nonetheless, he persevered, moving there with his wife, with whom he now works and manages the farm. Although many things have changed, he kept the name Santa Helena out of respect to the farm’s previous owner, who was very devoted to Saint Helen, mother of Constantine and a major figure in early Christianity.

Juan Pablo gives a great deal of attention to the ‘cultural’ works that happen on the farm annually. He does not have processing facilities on his small farm, so agricultural labour ‘in the field’ is where he can really add value and contribute to the coffee’s quality. Activities are as listed below, and these are completed primarily by him and his wife and by one maintenance worker, who works more or less year-round, completing tasks as required. During the harvest seasons (Colombia has two annually) he hires up to two day labourers and a driver to carry the cherry to the Flor de Apía mill, where his coffee is processed.

First trimester:

• Integrated weed management, including eliminating aggressive weeds and conserving beneficial weeds to maintain the vegetal cover of soils and preventing erosion.
• Fertilisation: the first cycle of application of the nutritional components to the crop is carried out according to the fertilisation needs of the plots.
• Renovation of by traditional pruning.

Second trimester:

• Collection of mitaca (fly crop) harvest.
• Delivery of cherry coffee to Flor de Apía wet mill.
• Phytosanitary control of pests and diseases of the coffee crop.

Third trimester:

• Second cycle of fertilisation according to the crop nutrition plan.
• Cutting of suckers and selection of the sprouts in the lots renewed by pruning.
• Integrated weed management and prevention of soil erosion.
• Phytosanitary control of pests and diseases of the coffee crop.

Fourth trimester:

• Collection of main harvest.
• Delivery of cherry coffee to Flor de Apía wet mill.
• Third cycle of fertilisation completed post-harvest collection
• Last annual cycle of weed management

Finca Santa Helena considers Flor de Apía S.A.S as its strategic ally. The company owns a wet mill locally, and has top of the line equipment, Pinalese equipment that works to conserve the quality of the coffee, every step of the way. The company’s mill has their top of the line facilities at Finca Barcelona, around 15 minutes from Santa Helena. During the harvest seasons, every day coffee is collected there and moved in the afternoon to the mill.

When Juan Pablo’s coffee reaches the mill, it is sorted by the Pinalese machines twice: first to remove stones and debris and then to remove any non-optimal cherries. The coffee is then pulped and fermented for around 16 hours. Flor de Apía keep strict records of every lot they process, and they have reported that this particular lot was dried in a vertical silo with an agitation system and whose heat source is the husk that results from threshing the coffee. Coffee is dried at around 40 degrees, very slowly (55 hours for this lot).

Flor de Apía has succeeded in placing their partners’ coffee on international speciality markets, thus earning small producers, such as Juan Pablo, much higher prices for their product. With the resulting profits, the fruit of his work, Juan Pablo plans to improve his home so that he and his wife can live more comfortably.

About Flor de Apía

Flor de Apía was established in 2010 by Mario Alexander and his then business partner (who has since retired). Mario – originally from Apía, Risaralda - was originally a welder by training. He spent time in France and Spain when he was younger, working in construction and as a gardener. After around one and a half years working in these trades in Europe, he received an offer from a gentleman for whom we was working to return to Colombia and source coffees and roast them for export to Spain. Mario jumped at the chance.

The original business partner then retired shortly after. Mario was still committed, however, and he approached the best friend of his ex-partner, Pierre Dumont, a sea captain at the time. Pierre was looking for a change, and he agreed with Mario that there was more opportunity for importing green coffee. A plan was born!

Mario purchased two neighbouring farms, Finca Barcelona and El Nivel, and established a wet and dry mill at Barcelona. Today, in addition to processing, roasting and exporting their own coffees, Flor de Apía buys cherry and wet coffee from 28 farmers in the municipality. The mill has 8 large capacity fermentation tanks, so they are able to keep individual lots separate, particularly where quality looks to be high. Their farmer-partners also grow a wide selection of varieties, from Maragogype and Castillo all the way to Geisha, Bourbon and Caturra. Flor de Apía makes every effort to encourage farmers to separate their lots by variety and promote rescuing the older varieties (such as Typica and Bourbon) to improve the quality of the region’s coffee.