LAMBARI (Brazil) – Seventh day of activities for the ten international baritas protagonists of the thid edition of Barista & Farmer, the talent show dedicated to quality coffee created by italian barista champion Francesco Sanapo. After the long bus ride from Pedregulho, it’s time for the participants to feel the atmpophere of Lambari, in the state of Minas Gerais and to get to know better the community of producers who lives in it.
Since 2010, the Lambari community has been involved in the sustainability project ¡Tierra! which the Giuseppe e Pericle Lavazza Onlus Foundation has been developing since 2002 in conjunction with the Rainforest Alliance NGO in order to improve the social and environmental conditions and the production methods of the communities of caficultores of the major coffee-growing countries.
Ricardo Da Silva (PICTURE) is the coffee taster and leader of the community: “I work in this sustainable coffee project with other producers, workers and friends with the goal of raising the quality of our product and straightening the commercial coffee chain due to a direct sale. This area of Brazil is very particular from a topographic point of view: there are big inclinations which make the work real hard but the product is very good. After improving the quality, we became more competitive also on the marketing aspect. I joined together the work of many local producers and now we are a real community that produces coffee which can reach the specifics and requests of the international markets and of whoever is interested in our coffee. Thanks to this union, we are able to continuously produce coffee in an harmonious way while maintaining our high quality, therefore raising our trust from the buyers. The other element that’s fundamental for us is the traceability of the product something that give us strong and recognizable identity. In the end, the idea is to make the coffee worthwile, so that our families and the next generations will be able to keep working with coffee but, more than anything, to remain here in Minas Gerais, our home.
The classic picking competition of the morning, in the occasion of the day in Lambarì, took a different and original twist: each barista was paired with local picker, an expert of the area, for a team competition. The winner was Olga Kaplinka, who immediatly shared her success with the brazilian picker, raising his arm in the sign of victory.
In the afternoon, the usual academy lessons have been replaced by two more competitions: cupping, which was won by indonesian Evani Jesslyn, and latte art where, once again, the local picker became the protagonists, guided by the expert hands of the baristas. The winner was Raphael Ferraz for a completely brazilian victory.
