Sustainable Coffee Production Practices in Colombia
Presented April 16, 2000 at the SCAA Convention in San Francisco by Gabriel Cadena Gómez, Ph.D., Director of Cenicafé

Sustainable agriculture means a number of things to different people. The basic idea may be summarized as improving quality of life using an environmentally sound approach, so that the resource base for future generations is maintained or enhanced. This presentation highlights the work done by Colombian Coffee growers to design innovative integrated sustainable practices that both protect and rejuvenate the human, social and ecological resources in Colombia's coffee growing areas. One particular area of focus is an environmentally sound method of coffee fruit processing, using Cenicafé's new technology: The ECOTECH reduces fresh water usage, controls organic pollution and uses byproducts for organic agriculture.