An Organic Oasis in Brazil
Ricardo de Aguiar Rezende is an organic coffee farmer—which is to say, he's an anomaly in Brazil. The owner of the Nossa Senhora de Fatima farm in the Cerrado region of Minas Gerais, Ricardo strives to make organic coffee production a viable livelihood in a country where such work is increasingly difficult.
Many of Ricardo’s peers in Brazil are abandoning organic coffee production, finding it much too hard or expensive to sustain. Inputs for organic production are costly, and Brazilian farmers have trouble finding the financing necessary to prepare for an organic harvest. Moreover, Brazil’s real has steadily appreciated against the dollar in the last few years, reducing farmer’s income by nearly half. In this daunting situation, many of Brazil’s best organic coffee farmers are being forced by their economic situation to return to conventional farming.
Yet, Ricardo maintains that organic production is the right choice for his land and his workers, and is dedicated to keeping Nossa Senhora de Fatima true to its organic roots. In order to remain economically viable, Ricardo has been improving his farming methods to produce coffee of very high quality. This includes making rich, organic compost fertilizers to increase yields and constructing better systems of irrigation for times of drought.
Currently, Ricardo is working with smaller farmers in the region to teach and train them how to farm organically. His efforts have been quite successful, and today, there is such a high demand for his training that he cannot respond to all requests. Organic production is rare in Brazil, but by showing his peers how organic farming in Brazil can be economically viable, Ricardo is pursuing his dream to foster organic coffees produced in a sustainable way.