Valle Inca is one of our most important partners anywhere in the world, in terms of both history and the quality of the coffees we buy. We’ve grown with them substantially: we bought around 40 bags from them in 2015 and now buy thousands every year. We also help them with financing, which is difficult for small groups in this area.
One thing that makes Valle Inca stand out is their leader Prudencio. He truly cares about making a positive impact in his community in a more tangible way than pretty much anyone else we work with. This was reaffirmed on a recent field visit to Rio Mapacho, which is extremely remote and inaccessible. He is committed to working further off the grid than anyone else, constantly extending the grid to bring more indigenous smallholders into the fold of better prices. In the Lares Valley, the Yanatile Valley, a lot of these farmers are well past where the road ends. He has to hike in for hours to make these connections.
Those producers’ coffees are now accessing a completely different market, paying at a far higher tier than previously because of this work. Like us, he doesn’t take shortcuts.
Flavor-wise, it’s constantly clear how worth the journey the coffees are.
