Nariño is Colombia's southernmost coffee-growing region, bordering Ecuador to the south and Cauca to its north. While each of Colombia's various coffee-growing regions has a distinct character in the cup, Nariño's unique climate conditions contribute to the special, sparkling quality of the coffees there. The dramatic slopes and valleys that comprise the landscape in this department have direct effect on the temperature modulation that creates these high-acidity, supersweet coffees: Warm, humid air collects in the lowlands during the day and creeps gently up the mountainsides at night, a combination that allows coffee to thrive at much higher altitudes than most of the rest of the country, as much as 2,300 meters above sea level.
Fundación Agraria y Ambiental Para el Desarrollo Sostentible (FUDAM) is a 300-member association of organic-certified (and Rainforest Alliance–certified) growers that was founded in the year 2000 by just seven producers who shared a vision of sustainable agriculture as well as environmental protection and development. This group of smallholders lives in and around the small municipality of La Unión in Nariño, where the terrain differs greatly from in other coffee-growing areas like Cauca: Instead of walking up from the town to the farms, as elsewhere, here the towns are at such high elevation that the farms are typically lower elevation, surrounded by high peaks and rough road.
FUDAM's membership believes firmly in the principles of sustainability that drove them to band together in the first place. When asked recently why the group continues to farm organically despite mounting pressure to rely on chemical inputs, the association’s leadership explained, “This is just how we live, these are our values and our way of life.”
The farmers pick their coffee during the day and depulp it in the afternoon, typically fermenting the lots for 16–24 hours dry. The coffees are generally washed two or three times before being dried either in small "casa elbas," mechanical dryers, or parabolic dryers. The mechanical drying takes between 25–40 hours, while the other drying structures can take up to 15 days.
Process Method: Colombia is best-known for its Washed coffees. While the processing details might vary slightly from farm to farm or by association, generally the coffee is picked ripe and depulped the same day, then given an open-air fermentation in tanks or buckets for anywhere between 12–36 hours. The coffee is washed clean of its mucilage before being dried either on patios, in parabolic dryers, solar driers, or mechanically. Some Washed coffees in Colombia are mechanically demucilaged.
