In Honduras, integrating breadfruit cultivation with coffee farming is emerging as a sustainable agricultural practice. Breadfruit trees, adaptable to elevations below 1200 meters, offer shade to coffee plants and require far less labor. This approach not only helps in maintaining coffee production but also adds a twice-yearly yield of breadfruit, enhancing food supply and diversifying income sources for farmers. This symbiotic relationship between breadfruit and coffee farming is proving to be an effective strategy to combat the challenges faced by traditional coffee cultivation in the region.
- Coffee rust has decimated the coffee harvest of Central America and
shows no sign of abating. - Cyclical (typically low) prices of coffee lead to poor profitability and
instability of coffee farms - Emigration from Honduras (mostly to the USA and Spain) has led to a
shortage of available labor for harvesting coffee, weeding farms, and
fertiling. - Breadfruit plantations require 1/10 the labor of a coffee farm year round
and especially during the harvest. - Breadfruit cultivation easily blends in with coffee, breadfruit trees can be
planted in current coffee farms below 1200 meters elevation as shade
without disruption of current production. - Breadfruit produces 2x per year (July/August and December/January), as
opposed to coffee which produces harvest between October and January.
Experience the taste of the tropics While helping reforest with our nutrient-rich breadfruit trees–the superfood of the future!
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