A huge thanks to all of you for your well wishes as our team in New York weathered the storm this week. We’re currently open and serving hot French press by candlelight on the Lower East Side until the power comes back on.
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| The mist rolls into Yawan. |
Our green bean buyer, Daniel, is currently traveling in Papua New Guinea. Here are his latest notes from the road:
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| Flowers were in bloom everywhere. Next year’s harvest! |
As I prepare for the next leg of my journey through the coffee lands of Asia-Pacific, I have a few moments to share a bit of what I’ve witnessed during my second visit to Papua New Guinea and the YUS Conservation Area.
This project is a collaboration between Caffe Vita and the Woodland Park Zoo’s Tree Kangaroo Conservation Project (TKCP), aimed at improving the livelihoods of the farmers of the YUS Conservation Area through quality development and providing a market for their unique coffee. The Conservation Area is the first ever in Papua New Guinea and it protects 180,000 acres of diverse environment including pristine cloud forest that is the habitat of the endangered Matschie’s tree kangaroo. The landowners who have pledged this area live in villages along the Yopno, Uruwa, and Som watersheds, with coffee representing their only major source of income. Caffe Vita’s purchase of the highest quality from last year’s crop was the beginning of what we hope to be a long and fruitful relationship that will benefit both conservation and community.
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| Berau shows us a tree he planted in January. |
Though it has only been slightly over a year since my last visit to YUS, the farmers have made significant strides toward improving quality and strengthening the coffee community. Coffee gardens have been cleaned and pruned: seeds planted, shade cover improved, and drainage ditches dug. Knowledge and training has spread from village to village, broadening the high standards of picking, fermenting, and drying that we began to implement last year. Many new solar driers have been built and we have refined the designs further to make them more effective.
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| A frame for a new solar dier with the farmers of Worin. |
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| A new solar drier. |
I was able to spend many hours speaking with the farmers of YUS and motivation is high after the purchase from last year is already having tangible effects throughout the area. Funds from the purchase have been invested in new pulping equipment, solar driers, and most significantly in the education and livelihoods of the future generations of YUS.
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| Future coffee growers of Mungku. |
The past two weeks have been challenging yet rewarding and as I continue on my way towards Indonesia I leave with the knowledge that we have made significant progress towards implementing changes and proposing ideas that will continue to improve quality and strengthen the community of coffee growers of YUS.
Mark your calendars! Vita’s teaming up with The Vera Project for the 2nd annual Coffee For the Kids. For the week of November 5th-9th, we’ll be donating 10% of sales from our Capitol Hill cafe to support The Vera Project’s mission to provide quality, affordable, concerts and classes to people of all ages.
Join us for Capitol Hill’s Blitz Art Walk on Thursday, November 8th, for an opening reception featuring screen-printed show posters by Vera designers.
Join us for Public Brewing School on Saturday, October 27th with Ross! We’ll feature home brewing methods like Chemex, pour over, French press, Bialetti, and siphon.
For more information and to reserve your free spot, email trainingdept@caffevita.com. Classes are held at our Capitol Hill location and usually run from 10AM-12PM.
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| Creating a stencil for our bags. |
Our green bean buyer, Daniel, is currently traveling in Papua New Guinea. Here are his latest notes from the road:
I’ve been in the port city of Lae, Morobe Province for the past three days hastily preparing the first portion of the second harvest from the YUS Conservation Area for export to the United States. While the logistics of transporting and processing coffee are usually challenging, Papua New Guinea takes the prize for being the most difficult. The extremely rugged terrain and lack of infrastructure has lead to the isolation of many peoples, while contributing to the incredible diversity of the country (over 800 distinct languages), is not the most conducive to purchasing the amazing coffees of this land. Small aircraft remain our most viable option to transport the coffee, but the one aviation company that services the airstrips of YUS has not been very helpful to say the least. Fortunately, just yesterday, the remainder of the coffee from Sapmanga has made it out. We have been running all over town, purchasing jute, marking the bags, milling the coffee and finally delivering to the export warehouse. The vessel is due to embark on its journey to the U.S. later this month.
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| Milling and bagging the coffee. |
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| Unloading the export to warehouse. |
Tomorrow morning I will fly into Sapmanga with Benjamin and Dono and spend the following six days hiking to the villages of Gomdan, Mungku, Boksawin, Worin, Toweth, and Yawan to meet with the farmers.
We will keep you updated on Daniel’s travels as he shares photos and stories from this amazing trip.
Tomorrow, artists and friends of Vita Stephen Stum and Jason Hallman invite you to come experience the way they create, live and share art. Both Jason and Stephen will be featured this winter in a group show in our bean room December 21st-23rd. Be on the lookout for more details to come.
Stallman gallery is located at 2331 E. Madison St, 98112.
As promised, here are some choice shots of Kelse Kwaiser competing in the World Siphon Championship in Tokyo on Friday.
Competitors were judged in siphon preparation, technique, presentation, and taste. We’ll pass along more updates as Kelse’s adventure continues!
