Harvesting methods

Did you know that coffee beans are still largely harvested by hand? I was surprised to learn this! With coffee being a popular commodity in 2024, you'd think all farmers would have turned to machinery.

However, peak ripeness is crucial for a quality cup, and coffee cherries ripen individually. Some farmers use equipment to strip branches, but then must remove immature fruit, compromising quality.

In Brazil, flat lands allow for machinery to shake fruit off branches, but once again, this method results in perfectly ripened fruit mixed with unripened.

Conscientious farmers aim to have pickers hand-select ripe cherries, leaving unripe ones for another pass. The largest difficulty is that high-altitude growth is required for quality coffee, but mountainous regions make it challenging and dangerous for workers to pick on steep inclines.

Finding a crew willing to do this work is hard, often relying on migrant pickers from economically disadvantaged countries like Nicaragua. Balancing fair wages while keeping costs low for farmers is increasingly difficult!

Wow! I'm really going to appreciate my cup of coffee this morning, aren't you?