To Stop the Coffee Apocalypse, Starbucks Buys a Farm
Carlos
Mario crouches next to a knee-high seedling growing in a plug of volcanic soil
wrapped in black plastic. The young plant will one day be a coffee tree. A
yellow sign identifies it as “Par 1 Plan 1,” the code name for a new coffee
hybrid. The mermaid logo on Mario’s black cap identifies his employer.
Par 1 Plan
1 is one of 165,000 seedlings growing on a Costa Rican ridge 4,500 feet above
sea level. The plants are arranged in long, neat rows within a 7.5-acre
trapezoid crisscrossed with white irrigation pipe; there are scores of
varieties, with names like Obata, Bourbon 2, and Et 47-P1. The patch is an
open-air laboratory where Mario, a slight, 52-year-old agronomist with a
salt-and-pepper mustache, tends to what he calls his “little babies.”
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