Huehuetenango Coffee Kids

ROAST PROFILE: Medium
COUNTRY: Guatemala 
REGION: Huehuetenango
GROWER: Civil Comercializadora Maya Alternitiva (COMAL) & Union Pequenos Productores (UPC)
ELEVATION: 1,300- 1,800 masl
PROCESS: Washed

FARM INFO
Building off the results and impact from Coffee Kids projects in the Trifinio region of Central America (the border area among Honduras, Guatemala, and El Salvador), the program has expanded into Western Guatemala. Coffee Kids is currently working with more than 100 youths across six youth groups in Huehuetenango.

This Coffee Kids comes specifically from two producer associations: Civil Comercializadora Maya Alternitiva (COMAL) and Union Pequenos Productores (UPC). Both are committed to increasing the participation of the youth within their organizations.

Recently, Coffee Kids began training these young people in different ways to process coffee, including honey and natural processing. The youth also learn about climate adaptation, from setting up demonstration plots to test and evaluate different practices, to building irrigation systems for better water management.
 

The goal of Coffee Kids is to awaken the entrepreneurial spirit in young farmers, to encourage them to believe in themselves, and to ensure better livelihoods for themselves and their families. The program combines training, mentoring, and financing. Since 2015, it has reached more than 550 youth from Trifinio, Western Guatemala, Tanzania, and Colombia and helped make possible more than 170 youth-run local businesses.