
{"id":826,"date":"2007-08-30T13:14:54","date_gmt":"2007-08-30T21:14:54","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.carrborocitizen.com\/main\/2007\/08\/30\/an-%e2%80%98eye-opening%e2%80%99-tour-of-honduras\/"},"modified":"2007-08-30T13:14:54","modified_gmt":"2007-08-30T21:14:54","slug":"an-%e2%80%98eye-opening%e2%80%99-tour-of-honduras","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/2007\/08\/30\/an-%e2%80%98eye-opening%e2%80%99-tour-of-honduras\/","title":{"rendered":"An \u00e2\u20ac\u02dceye opening\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 tour of Honduras"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><em><strong>By Jack Carley<\/strong><br \/>\nStaff Writer<\/em><\/p>\n<p>Scott Conary knows coffee. He knows it well enough to be head judge for the World Barista Competition in Tokyo \u00e2\u20ac\u201c which is like the Olympics, only more aromatic.<\/p>\n<p>The co-owner of the Open Eye Cafe knows it well enough to teach to even the people who actually grow coffee what it takes to make a good cup. And for 16 days in Honduras, that\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s what he did.<\/p>\n<p>Conary was flown to the Honduran mainland in late June. A grant from USAID, organized by Winrock International, a non-profit working toward economic development, covered the flight and rooming expenses.<\/p>\n<p><!--more--><\/p>\n<p>There, in coordination with IHCAFE, the Honduran Coffee Association, he toured coffee-growing regions dispensing advice on how to prepare the perfect bean and brew the perfect espresso.<\/p>\n<p>Conary explains, \u00e2\u20ac\u0153It was an overview of the entire coffee industry of Honduras.<br \/>\n\u00e2\u20ac\u0153I spent 14-hour days just constantly going from one place to the next. Every day.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<\/p>\n<p>Conary was helping small growers understand what he called \u00e2\u20ac\u0153the connection<br \/>\nbetween process and product.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<\/p>\n<p>\u00e2\u20ac\u0153They know growing, they know milling, the only thing they\u00e2\u20ac\u2122re missing is the connection of what they\u00e2\u20ac\u2122re doing and what it means in the end.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<\/p>\n<p>Because stock markets treat coffee as a commodity, farmers have less incentive to prepare quality beans, Conary explains. \u00e2\u20ac\u0153There\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s really no connection to quality \u00e2\u20ac\u00a6 it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s just market-driven price. That\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s the disconnect that farmers have.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<\/p>\n<p>Because he also co-owns the Carrboro Coffee Company, the roasting wing of the Open Eye (you may have smelled it in the mornings), Conary was able to help small farmers roasting with relatively basic equipment.<\/p>\n<p>\u00e2\u20ac\u0153I was amazed at the stuff I saw and what people were doing with it,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d he said, \u00e2\u20ac\u0153they\u00e2\u20ac\u2122re completely winging it.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d But by helping small producers find better equipment \u00e2\u20ac\u201d and making a few quick fixes here and there \u00e2\u20ac\u201d Conary hopes to help.<br \/>\nIronically, Conary says, Hondurans don\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t drink the best coffee.<\/p>\n<p>\u00e2\u20ac\u0153They grow it, they sell it, it gets shipped out of the country\u00e2\u20ac\u00a6. Whatever\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s left, that\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s what they drink. So they have no idea \u00e2\u20ac\u201d the best coffee is gone.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<\/p>\n<p>And with the best being exported, the culture of coffee shops has had trouble in developing countries. Conary taught classes in brewing espresso to the growing \u00e2\u20ac\u0153caf\u00c3\u00a9 culture,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d in Honduras, where rising baristas are improving their techniques and their beans.<\/p>\n<p>The work also has a social aspect. If farmers can\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t make enough money to keep farming, they are more likely to move to large cities that cannot support them.<\/p>\n<p>Slums without proper infrastructure for sanitation and other basic needs are the inevitable result.<\/p>\n<p>\u00e2\u20ac\u0153People are migrating to the cities because, generally, they\u00e2\u20ac\u2122re not making the money they need farming. And that\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s part of our goal, too \u00e2\u20ac\u201c to prevent that kind of thing from happening \u00e2\u20ac\u00a6 to get people to stay in their communities and farm them.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<\/p>\n<p>Conary says he will return in the picking season (in Honduras, November to February) and continue the work.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>By Jack Carley Staff Writer Scott Conary knows coffee. He knows it well enough to be head judge for the World Barista Competition in Tokyo \u00e2\u20ac\u201c which is like the Olympics, only more aromatic. The co-owner of the Open Eye Cafe knows it well enough to teach to even the people who actually grow coffee&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":12,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9,25],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-826","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-features","category-land-and-table"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/826","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/12"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=826"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/826\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=826"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=826"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=826"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}