Vote for the Photo of the Month: January 2026
Our monthly photo series highlights the beauty and emotion in the lives of our clients around the world. This month, we're highlighting the many ways that farmers and entrepreneurs are investing in change.
PHOTO 1:
When Chaquila José Augusto first started her business in 2020, she struggled to make sales. “At the beginning, I would sell just a loaf of bread per day,” she recalled. It was not nearly enough to live on, and she sometimes wondered if she had made a mistake by starting her own business.
In 2023, Chaquila joined a TechnoServe program working with micro- and small-growing businesses in northern Mozambique. She learned critical skills to improve her business operations, and, eventually, her perseverance paid off. She began selling 10 loaves per day and even saved up enough money to open another small shop. Today, she owns multiple shops and employs several people in her community.
PHOTO 2:
In 2012, Reyna Oristela García established Finca Nueva Santa Rosa, a coffee farm perched high in the mountains of southern Honduras. Coffee fascinated Reyna, but she had only been growing coffee for a few years and didn’t have the technical knowledge necessary to grow it successfully.
Reyna was not alone. Many other farmers in her community also struggled to make a living selling their coffee. The trees in the area did not yield enough coffee cherries, and farmer organizations were too weak to negotiate reasonable prices or to secure direct sales with exporters.
In 2018, Reyna heard of a TechnoServe program and decided to join. She learned important skills that transformed her farm into a thriving business, and she has maintained the consistency of her great cup profiles. “Before, [the intermediaries] would purchase one quintal of wet parchment coffee from me for $25,” she explained. “Now we were recently paid $400 per quintal for our coffee.”
PHOTO 3:
Ethiopia’s Jimma region is the birthplace of Arabica coffee, where farmers have cultivated the crop for generations. While the climate and altitude are ideal for growing premium coffee, 15 years ago, the region was known for producing a poor-quality cup. Traditionally, farmers left the coffee cherries to over-ripen and drop to the ground, often damaging the beans.
Farmers here often received lower prices for their product, and the area remained trapped in a cycle of poverty until a group of farmers decided that they wanted better for their community. By forming a cooperative with support from TechnoServe, farmers were able to earn more from their coffee and reinvest in their communities. For example, the cooperative funded the construction of a new school to increase education opportunities for young people in the community.
