Is your coffee organic or grown organically?
Many of the farmers from whom we buy coffee do grow their coffee organically in a shade-grown environment. However, because many of these farms are small plots of land on the side of a mountain with other coffee farms above them, it is possible that another farmer may use non-organic practices that could wash down the mountain into the coffee plants. For coffee to be certified organic, the coffee farm, the processing and exporting location in that country along with the storage and roasting facilities all have to follow certain practices. It is rarely economically viable for small plot farmers to join this process due to the extra labor costs and fees. Read more about the difficulties facing many coffee farmers and how HOPE Coffee is empowering them.
In our video about the quality of HOPE Coffee, you will see that the coffee plants are shade grown. The fruit of these coffee plants are a cherry which contains two seeds (the coffee beans) that are removed from the cherry, washed, dried and stored before being exported. Once these beans arrive in the US, they are roasted at about 400 degrees and packaged. When that package is opened it is brewed by pouring 200 degree water over the ground coffee beans to produce a delicious cup of coffee. Unlike many fruits and vegetables that can be consumed raw, coffee is washed, dried, cooked and boiled before being consumed. This process, according to the US National Library of Medicine removes 99.8% of any chemicals that may have been previously present.
https://www.coffeereview.com/coffee-reference/coffee-and-health/pesticides-and-chemicals/
https://groundsforchange.com/blogs/learn/organic-coffee
https://www.cafecampesino.com/organic-coffee/
https://beanbox.com/blog/organic-coffee-fact-and-fiction/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/26344013