Speakers

About Finca Triunfo Verde

Hugo Lares Sierra is an agronomy engineer specializing in parasitology. For more than fifteen years, he has worked with small organic coffee producers in the State of Chiapas.

His experience with these small producers include organizing producer groups, applying agro-ecological production practices, developing and managing projects for financing by national and international institutions, contracting, risk management and international marketing, structuring internal organic surveillance and fair trade certification, production diversification and natural resource conservation projects and training of farmer/promoters in organic coffee production.

Mr. Lares is currently general manager for Triunfo Verde plantation, a civil partnership made up of 346 small producers in the highlands of Chiapas that produce, certify, process and export organic coffee to customers in the United States, Canada and England under fair trade conditions.

About Finca Triunfo Verde

Finca Triunfo Verde Sociedad Civil is a fair-trade and organic certified coop located within the buffer zone of El Triunfo Biosphere Reserve. The cooperative was founded in 2001 and has 262 members. Located in the highlands of the Sierra Madre de Chiapas, El Triunfo Biosphere Reserve is one of the world’s most diverse forest reserves. It has Mesoamerica’s largest continuous cloud forest, and it serves as a refuge to thousands of plant and animal species. El Triunfo is a rare and valuable sanctuary requiring continued protection and Triunfo Verde ensures this protection through various sustainable practices. All the coffee they produce is shade grown, and biological corridors are created in order to facilitate bird and animal migration.