Serving People Serving Coffee Since 2005
Issue link: http://baristamagazine.epubxp.com/i/659497
SA: So PEARL became SPREAD. Can you discuss why that happened, why the new focus was needed? I found a great quote from you about it in AgriLife Today, where you say, "This new project is based on the PEARL partnership's 'value chain' development efforts for high-value agricultural products. It's a grassroots effort to empower producers in rural communities by creating wealth through 'professionalizing' pro- cessing, quality evaluation, packaging, and shipping." TS: PEARL was a university project, an institution-building project, and those projects are necessary in the grander scheme of things but are not directly dealing with increasing farmer incomes and well-being in the present. In the PEARL project paper, nowhere was the word "coffee" used or referred to. It wasn't supposed to actually "do" some- thing at the level of farmers other than train Rwandans for university professor jobs and research. That was already a lofty goal in itself but it wasn't going help farmers make more money, which was absolutely what needed to happen in Rwanda in 2000. So USAID released a new request for proposals that was open to competition from private companies so that the bread-and-butter con- sulting firms could bid on a larger value chain project with coffee as a key commodity. Technoserve, Chemonics, and others all bid on it and so did we from Texas A&M.; We won it. We continued to work with farmer groups, brought in the Cup of Excellence, built regional cupping labs, created coffee maps, did applied quality research, created the first specialty roasting company, trained farmers with special coffee radio programs, launched local consumption roasting programs. All was rolling ahead well but I knew that it had to be Rwandan-ized to be a real sustainable success. As such, I left at the beginning of 2009 as the full-time project director and continued as senior advisor to the Rwandan director for two years at half time, going back and forth between France and Rwanda. It's not really a success if there is an expatriate white guy running it. The guy who turned it into a bonafide Rwandan success is Jean Claude Kayisinga, the new director, who is now the deputy CEO for all Rwanda Export Commodities, NAEB. SA: At what point did the idea for World Coffee Research come about? TS: It's a long story but I'll make it as short as possible… We were doing research in Rwanda on factors affecting cup quality, like fermentation time, drying methods, transport of cherry times, etc. As a researcher, the first thing you do when you want to do research is see what's already been done. Duh! So when I was looking in the literature for other work on factors affecting cup quality, I couldn't believe that there was so little! In fact, it was and is downright crazy. In 2007, I put together a one-pager on how SCAA needed to fund or promote a program on cup quality research. I saw Ric Rhinehart at his first SCAA show as director and talked to him about it and he really "got" it and supported the idea. A year later, Peter Giuliano invited me as a speaker to the first Symposium to talk about some of the research in quality that we were doing in Rwanda. It was amazing. The room was packed, people were in the hallway and super glued to the presentation and the results. After that, Bruce Mullins from CBI came up to me with their new CEO, Patrick Criteser, and said that they had seen the presentation and wanted to support more work like that. So we sat down over some bourbon and talked. We all quickly realized that the best way to do this kind of thing would be to get lots of industry support since this research benefits everybody. So we talked to Ric and Peter again, this time with CBI who said they were ready with funding. Keurig GMC also expressed great interest and said they'd also put funding into this kind of program. OK. There it was. We knew there was something "right" happening. Ric and Peter then asked me and my boss, Ed Price at the Texas A&M; Borlaug Institute, if Borlaug would allow me to put together a concept paper and that SCAA would cover all travel and other costs. Deal. There it was. I was working 50 percent on Rwanda and now, the other 50 percent was on the development of what was first called the Global Coffee Quality Research Initiative, GCQRI, and now called WCR. The concept was presented in its "fullness" at the Symposium in 2010, and later we met with about 70 roasting companies of all sizes at Texas A&M;, in a three-day hullaballoo to get "buy in" from industry to move forward or not with funding and the verdict was yes, the industry wants and needs this, but let's change the name! Off we went. We raised $1.2 million in 2011 and then launched WCR in April of 2012. SA: Was WCR developed primarily to identify solutions to climate change and the effects on coffee? Your research programs include coffee biodiversity, the sensory project, the International Variety Trial, and others. Are these all in effect designed to strengthen coffee in the face of climate change? TS: Yes and no. All that stuff you mention are ways to find solutions to adapt coffee to changing climate, but our main driver was and is volume and quality of coffee. Yes, climate smart and all that, but volume and quality. These are the things that impact whether a coffee farmer makes any money. If they aren't making money, they're not going to grow coffee and the whole thing falls apart. Who wants a climate-smart poor- quality coffee that can't produce over one ton per hectare? It won't work. When you work with genetics you automatically work with cli- mate and climate change because you are selecting out the good genetic stuff that does well over years in varying climates. That is climate smart to begin with. The big challenge with climate change is keeping the "quality" maintained as you keep productivity up in the face of increasing temperatures. For us, that's what the World Coffee Research Sensory Lexicon is all about. It's there as a discriminatory "measuring" tool to insure that quality is not lost as yield traits are compiled. In fact, I think it's possible to increase yield and quality at the same time even with the effects of a changing climate. SA: Can you tell me about a few of the projects you're working on that are particularly exciting to you? TS: My pet project is the On Farm Demo Trial project, where we take two to three of the best varieties known and test them on large plots in farmer fields with a soil amendment. In my opinion, this is what has been missing in order to grow volumes of quality coffee. For the farmer, they absolutely must know (as in not just see) they are going to make money on something if they're going to change the way they are doing some- thing. It's all about the farmer and increasing their profit. So, you have to go into their farms and put a large plot of two new great varieties with disease resistance, high cup quality, high yield, etc., and you plant that right next to their own variety and system. Then, when the harvest comes a couple years later, they go crazy and see that there is real money in this new technology stuff! It's a kind of market- ing strategy, but not empty, stupid marketing—it's the real thing for the right reason. Otherwise, it has not and will not work. I have tons of stuff to say about this program because it has so much to offer the farmer and over time, it is this program that will drive huge decisions in climate-smart coffee growing through the analysis of the big data it will produce over years and countries. It's the "pulse" of coffee growing. SA: Are there any other projects, visions, works, etc., that you would like mentioned in this article? TS: Just want to mention that I hope to get a chance to develop an espresso project expressly for espresso coffees. Using the new WCR Sensory Lexicon, [I want to] work with the espresso artists to identify the flavors and aromas that make exquisite blends, as well as for single origins. [I want to] understand why. I know illyCaffé has done a lot here, and we'd like to build on it. I personally think espresso coffees will be an easier game than the filter brews in terms of identifying the attri- butes, right combinations, origin proportions, type soils, varieties, etc., that produce them. La Marzocco is interested in pushing the envelope here with us, so we'll see how it all shakes out soon. 118 barista magazine