NESTLE Philippines targets to help increase coffee production in the country through their Nescafe Plan.
In his presentation during the 2017 Regional Business and Climate Summit at the Pinnacle Hotel and Suites last Tuesday, September 12, Nestle Philippines vice president for corporate affairs engineer Jess Reyes said a few decades ago, the Philippines is abundant of coffee to the point of exporting it to other countries. Currently, however, only 30 percent of the coffee in the country is from the local coffee farmers. The rest are already imported.
“Nescafe Plan is a Nestle initiative to increase the yield of our coffee farmers and also reverse the trend and making the Philippines able to supply more coffee. Through this plan, we are able to produce the good quality planting materials which we sell at a lower cost to our coffee farmers. We provide technical training to our farmers in the different parts of the country and also monitor their progress,” said Reyes.
Nescafe Plan has also set up buying stations wherein Nestle buys the coffee from coffee farmers all over the country.
“We’ve got agronomists who are assigned in the different parts of the country to help our coffee farmers. Coffee grows in specific areas in the country where there is good elevation and good soil,” Reyes said.
Ash and sludge, which normally end up as waste, are being used in coffee plantations as compost or organic soil conditioner.
Reyes said this helps with the reduction of coffee production wastes while pushing for healthier and more coffee yields.