＃3 Agroforestry no koto
Normally, in major coffee-growing areas,
coffee trees are planted in “plantations”, where coffee trees are planted all over the field. However, the coffee trees in Harupang
are planted alongside vegetable fields or in the forest.
These methods are known as ‘agroforestry’ or ‘mixed planting’,
where the characteristics of both crops are utilised.
In the village of Harpan, coffee beans are grown as a kind of ‘sideline’, so they can increase their income without forcibly changing their previous lifestyle and still diversify the risk of their income source. Agroforestry also helps to protect the environment. Agriculture is a surprisingly environmentally destructive industry. Excessive fertilisers and pesticides make the soil unusable due to unbalanced nutrients in the soil, and excessive cutting and burning of forests can lead to landslides, desertification, loss of biodiversity and global warming, among other negative effects. However, agroforestry has changed the conventional concept of ‘agriculture = cutting down forests’ to ‘agriculture = creating forests’.
In Harpan Village, coffee is planted in the forest and under trees, creating a natural environment where coffee trees, which do not like direct sunlight, can grow easily. Therefore, no pesticides are used, and all fertilisers, such as manure from livestock and rice straw from the rice fields, are all natural products that can be procured in the village.
However, this way of farming is time-consuming. Because the coffee is grown on mountain slopes and terraced fields, it is not possible to install machinery, and all management is done by hand. In addition, coffee undergoes several refining processes, such as washing and drying, from the red berries (coffee cherries) to the green beans, which are also done by hand. For this reason, it is not possible to produce coffee in large quantities. Therefore, it is rarely available in Japan. However, the coffee from Harupang Village contains the essence of sustainable coffee cultivation and consumption in the future.
If the coffee cultivation in Harupang Village becomes a model and spreads to the rest of the world, the future will surely be better. Our coffee is such a precious coffee.
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