As the vast majority of AAA farmers are smallholders, especially in Colombia, they often lack the resources to invest in appropriate water treatment facilities. The outcome of our Tool for the Assessment of Sustainable Quality (TASQ™) indicates that many of these smallholder farms do not have the appropriate equipment for either domestic wastewater treatment or coffee-processing water treatment. The cost of providing such facilities on a farm-by-farm basis for the tens of thousands of farms we buy from is prohibitive, so we have been working with local partners to find more efficient and creative solutions that can protect water, improve crop quality and drive profitability for coffee farmers.

WATER TREATMENT: Diego Jaramillo Diez, a Nespresso coffee farmer, at a wet mill in Jardin, Colombia.

The installation of the micro-central mill in Jardín Antioquia is one such solution. Inaugurated in December 2010 as a joint undertaking between Nespresso, USAID, ACDI/VOCA, Cafexport and the local cooperatives, this new mill will provide coffee-milling services initially for 110 coffee farmer families in the region, avoiding the need to replicate equipment in each farm and improving coffee quality. The mill will save an average of 27 000 litres of water per farm and increase farmer profitability by 30%.

The content of this page was externally assured by Bureau Veritas, March 2011.