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The key to the consistency from Finca La Piragua is Alexander Vargas Osorio’s commitment to standardising all the processes on the farm and during the harvest. Alexander has always been interested in producing the highest quality of coffee his farm is able to grow, and over the last few years he has taken the extra step of installing a small sample roaster at the farm to help his own understanding of his coffee. A sample roaster can roast around 100g of green coffee, which is enough to evaluate a single lot and its potential. With this flavour analysis and information collated from the growing and processing conditions, Alexander can determine which steps in his methods need adjusting to improve the quality of his coffee. It isn’t that long ago that farmers were not able to taste their own coffee. It was often sold to buying points or at the farm gate for the day’s cash price which was set according to the market conditions and physical inspection of the coffee. Farmers missed out on premiums for great tasting coffee, simply due to the lack of opportunity to understand their own product. This started to change with the influx of specialty buyers who made the time and facilities available to taste coffee with the farmers from whom they were buying. Alexander has closed that knowledge gap even further by conducting his own analysis and experimentation. He says that is has been a decisive factor in the quality of his coffee. See newsletters for more information about how we buy coffee in Colombia.