​In August of the year 2018, the price of coffee reached levels considered alarming by the majority of those who work in the coffee industry. For the first time in 12 years, the "C" price in New York fell below 100cts/lb. While it is true, the average price of the last 12 years is not much higher than 120cts/lb, this decline generated unprecedented reactions in the specialty coffee world, which we think is positive.

Historically, the price of coffee has been extremely volatile, due to the never ending discrepancies between supply and demand. But these constant cycles of highs and lows, have devastating effects for producers and coffee workers from around the world. Of course, in the United States this crisis goes virtually unnoticed, where the global coffee market is dominated by few multinationals: Kraft General Foods, Nestle, Procter & Gamble, Sara Lee, J.M. Smucker Company, Starbucks Corporation and Dunkin’ Donuts. 

Globally, coffee is a US $ 100 billion business annually (Business Insider 2018), but producing countries only capture US $ 20 billion of this value, with most of the profits being retained in developed countries. As on the supply side, the coffee world is very fragmented, with millions of small-scale coffee farmers, the power of the business lies in the large importers and roasters, who buy the green beans and process them into various products.

But what would happen: if small coffee farmers knew exactly how much their product is worth? If they could calculate their production, logistics and marketing costs? And if they could obtain a price that promotes the quality and sustainability of their production?

​We strongly believe that the key to unlock this crisis, does not lie on the same companies that have controlled the business for centuries, but it is at the origin. It should not be New York, London or Berlin, who decides what is the "fair price" that a coffee farmer must obtain. But it must be the coffee farmer, informed and empowered, who demand the price that he deems appropriate, according to the quality he obtained and the investment he made.

We have an invaluable opportunity in the young and new generations of coffee growers, with unlimited access to online information, eager to learn and with a global mind set. There is where we must aim all our efforts to improve  this reality.

Let's make this a sustainable business for everyone and enjoy your specialty coffee!

If climate change will be held in a temperature increase of 2ºC or less (Aim of the Paris Agreement 2015); By 2050 it is estimated that 40% of all Carbon Dioxide (CO2) emissions will be caused by ships and airplanes only, if not properly regulated.

​Right now, there are about 50,000 ships sailing the oceans and seas, to bring us 90% of all the products we consume daily. From bananas to petrol and from cell phones to coffee beans. Almost everything the world produces is transported by ships.
 
And despite the fact that many innovations have been made to improve the efficiency of airframes, engines, aerodynamics and the general operations of airplanes, only in the European Union, greenhouse gas emissions from aviation increased by 87% between 1990 and 2006.

​In Kilimanjaro Specialty Coffees we travel directly to origin to search, cup and select those extraordinary coffee lots you enjoy so much. We can't do this work by video-conference or by phone, it is essential for us, to know the reality of the origin and the coffee producers. As well as for these coffees to reach your roaster at an attractive and competitive price, we must transport them by sea.
 
But we are aware of the impact that our work generates in the environment. Therefore, from this year onwards we will begin to measure the CO2 emissions that are released into the atmosphere due to our production process.

​By identifying and quantifying our sources of CO2 emissions, we can define better objectives and more effective emission reduction strategies, in addition to a compensation commitment through the generation of incentives for planting more coffee trees in the different places of the world where we are working.
 
Our goal is to become a "Neutral Carbon" company, which means we are removing the same amount of CO2 from the atmosphere, as the one we are generating.
 
For a healthier planet, with more and better coffee.

​The history of coffee in Indonesia, as in many others producing countries around the world, begins with tales of colonialism, slavery, monopoly and multinational corporations (Yes! The first ones of modern history were set in the early 17th century).

In the year 1602 the Dutch government established the “Dutch East India Company” (VOC; Verenigde Oost-indische Compagnie) as a chartered company and granted it a 21-year monopoly on the Dutch spice trade. This was the first model of what we consider today a multinational corporation.

​In the year 1616 the Dutch East India Company started with coffee trading in Mocha (Yemen), and during the first half of the 17th century, they only traded coffee in the Arab world and Asia, because there was no demand for coffee in Europe at that time.

During the late 17th century, coffeehouses spread all over Europe and the Dutch, English and French started to trade coffee from different Arab ports. The Arabs had forbidden the trade coffee in fertile beans or plants, of course, they wanted to keep their monopoly, but when coffee became very popular in Europe around the 1690, and political problems in the Arab countries threatened coffee imports, different European countries tried to get coffee plants or seedlings for trading purposes.

​The race to make off with some live coffee trees or beans was eventually won by the Dutch. They obtained the coffee plants most likely in Malabar (India), where the Dutch East India Company ruled.

The coffee plants were introduced in Batavia (today Jakarta) Indonesia in 1696. In 1711 the first coffee exports were shipped from Java to Europe. The first coffee shipment was around 450 kg. Ten years later the export had already grown to 60.000 kg.

Originally coffee was cultivated only in Java, but in 1870, the Dutch expanded growing areas of Arabica to Sumatra, Bali, Sulawesi and Timor. In northern Sumatra, coffee was first cultivated near Lake Toba in 1888; and then in the Mountains of Gayo, near lake Tawar, by 1924.