Building Coffee Growers’ Capacity

TechnoServe helped coffee producer groups become more profitable by growing and selling lucrative specialty coffee. Using tools such as traceability software and quality management systems, TechnoServe business advisors trained the producers in industry best practices.

In El Salvador, coffee producer groups are key aggregators and processors of smallholder coffee. Between 2008 and 2011, TechnoServe supported these groups to become more profitable and to increase the incomes of their farmer members by implementing innovative production and processing technologies that would allow them to improve the quality of their production, minimize deforestation and environmental waste, and tap into the specialty coffee market.

In partnership with the Consejo Salvadoreño del Café and Guatemala’s Asociación Nacional del Café, TechnoServe business advisors trained producer groups in industry best practices – such as the use of traceability software and quality management systems – yielding exceptional results over the project’s four-year duration. By the project’s end, TechnoServe helped to sustainably increase production by more than 2 million pounds of high-quality coffee for each year of the project, generating more than $1.5 million in sales and nearly 120,000 jobs within these coffee-producing communities.