Bolivia Finca Floripondio - Pedro Rodriguez

 
PEDRO RODRIGUEZ

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PEDRO RODRIGUEZ
, he is the owner of Floripondio and creator of Agricafe in Bolivia along with his daughter Daniela and son Pedro Pablo. Together they are making big sustainable changes to the Bolivian coffee producing markets after a devastating decline back in 2016, today Agricafe has 12 farms and around 130 Hectares of coffee under their banner of ‘Fincas Los Rodriguez’. The Rodriguez family’s approach to coffee production has been extremely methodical, innovative and scientific. Along the way, they consulted leading specialty coffee agronomists from around the world to help them produce exceptional coffee and build sustainable and healthy farms.

Agricafe is a Bolivia family business which founded by Pedro Rodriguez, in 1986 and managed together with his daughter Daniela and his son Pedro Pable. The mission of Agricafe is to do its part in reversing the declining production trend, while allowing coffee producers to have a fair price for their hard work. To do this, they managed their own farm as a model, and introduced two social program "The Buena Vista Project" and the "Sol de la Mañana Program", to assist and educate the local producer by providing training and necessary skill for a modern coffee farming and harvesting. The purpose of the program is to produce better quality coffee and provide farmers with fair prices that allow them to provide a better life to their families.

The Rodriguez family’s approach to coffee production has been extremely methodical, innovative and scientific. Along the way, they consulted leading specialty coffee agronomists from around the world to help them produce exceptional coffee and build sustainable and healthy farms. A wide range of varieties have been trialed, along with different farming techniques, to optimise quality and output. They have carefully documented their findings at every step of the way and continue to innovate and invest in improvements to produce the very best quality coffee they can.

The Rodriguez farms are some of the most organised and beautiful we have come across. Coffee is well spaced in neat rows and meticulously planted by variety, making picking and lot separation much easier to manage than on more traditional farms in the region. The farms are vibrant, luscious and healthy, and produce exceptional quality and yields.






FINCA FLORIPONDIO

Floripondio | Melbourne Coffee Merchants

Floripondio is one of the more recent farms planted in Samaipata, where the Rodriguez family has been experimenting with growing specialty coffee. Historically, this region has not been known for producing coffee, but after success in growing exceptional coffee at their first farm in the region – El Fuerte – the Rodriguez family have continued investing more heavily in the region, planting four more farms, including Floripondio, and building a wet mill to process the coffee.

Floripondio was established in 2014. The farm is 47 hectares in size, 29 of which are planted with coffee. The farm sits at a staggering 1,710 meters above sea level. This high altitude, along with daily temperatures ranging widely from 5-30 ˚C, helps to ensure a very slow maturation of the coffee cherries on the farm. The slow maturation leads to an increased concentration of sugars in the cherry and bean, which in turn helps to produce an incredibly sweet and complex coffee.

Because of Floripondio’s high altitude, its tropical microclimate, and its distinct soil profile, the Rodriguez family has chosen to locate their variety nursery at the farm. To date, they have planted over 50 varieties and their objective is to work out which are best suited to the land and this particular latitude and altitude.

Floripondio gets its name from the Floripondio flowers (commonly known as Angel’s Trumpet in English) that are native to the area and grow throughout the farm. The flower is thought to possess some hallucinogenic properties, and legend has it that as soon as you lay down beneath a Floripondio tree you start dreaming. This is apt, as the natural scenery at Floripondio is breathtakingly beautiful and can at times, seem like something out of a dream.