At the Santa Maria farmers' co-op in Guatemala, we visited the farmers who started growing organic cardamom four years ago. Organic farmer Lorenzo Ich receives a 6% to 10% premium for his organic cardamom depending on its quality. Besides the price, Lorenzo and his fellow co-op members enjoy a kind of prestige that comes along with being an organic farmer. The co-op taught him how to be an organic farmer -- how to manage his soil, his paperwork and his crops -- so he can provide for his family a little better when he sells his organic cardamom each year.
Lorenzo harvests each cardamom plant every two weeks, starting as the first fruits ripen in early September and making the last harvest in February. Pods harvested too early will be low quality -- both light in color and light in flavor. Pods left on the plant too long burst open and lose their seeds, so Lorenzo must be diligent in his harvesting in order to insure he gets the most production. The whole co-op turns out for the harvest, with farm families moving from field to field and helping each other with the harvest. Older kids also help when they are not in the co-op's school.
Lorenzo and the rest of the Santa Maria co-op are members of a cooperative that is a Well Earth supplier. The co-op not only acts as the marketing arm for its members, it also provides a wide array of services, such as:
Our supplier of cardamom is a cooperative owned by many grower cooperatives in the mountains of Guatemala. They decided to make the move into organics since the farmers already used almost no chemicals on their crops, and they saw an increasing demand for organic crops. The 15-year co-op veteran who was our guide expressed the view held by many of the farmers:
"I believe in the future we will come back to organic . . . and all growers will again be organic."
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