Letefoho, November 26, 2024 (Média Democracia) – The Leobasa community in Lauana Village is crying out for a long dry season that has resulted in a decline in coffee production due to the effects of climate change, such as strong winds that damage coffee beans and the large number of fallen trees that cause coffee plants to die.
Anita Soares de Jesus, a coffee farmer in Leobasa, said that the impact of the long summer on coffee plants means that coffee beans cannot grow well because they are exposed to strong winds due to the long summer.
“The coffee that we planted did not produce good results because of the long summer, strong winds caused the coffee to fall over and could not produce good fruit, because it was too hot it made the coffee wilt, but if the rainy season came on time then the coffee could produce good fruit,” said Anita to reporters in Leobasa, last Wednesday.
She said that last year the coffee he planted did not produce good results. She saw last month that the coffee had flowered well but she did not know the exact results because the coffee fruit was still small and recently because of the long summer the rain came late, that is why the coffee results are not yet known, just wait for next year.
Santina da Silva continued, this year the rainfall was not on time so it had an impact on the fall of coffee flowers because the rain fell in November.
“There is no rain and wind that makes the flowers fall, I think if there are few because of lack of rainwater, this year the rain came late in November, the coffee has flowered but we don’t know yet in the fields, so we’ll just see whether it will bear a lot of fruit or not because the rain comes and stops, so we’ll just see whether it bears a lot of fruit or not.” She said.
Santina said that this year, coffee only had a relatively small selling price, such as to NCBA with skin priced at 0.50 cents, but when sold to Japanese companies, it could reach $3.00 to $4.00.
“Coffee is expensive, but if we take it directly to the coffee grinder, the price is expensive, but if we weigh it at NCBA, the price is cheap, but it’s different from Japanese companies, the price is expensive, the price of coffee depends on the coffee fruit, if there are a lot of fruit we get a lot of profit, but if there are few fruit we also get a little profit,” She said.
Meanwhile, on the coffee plantations there are only spruce because they are more durable, while the coffee in the highlands does not produce fruit as good as the coffee on land, and on their plantations there are two types of coffee, such as Arabica coffee and Mocha coffee because the quality is good, the fruit is clear and the taste is good.
She added that in Leobasa there were no extension technicians who came to observe the coffee and plants in the field, only the NCBA company carried out supervision and rehabilitation of the coffee, she did not know about payment.
“Until now, no one has come to see our coffee and plants. Only NCBA came and asked to plant coffee, but until now they haven’t, some of our coffee trees were cut down so that they can grow again and bear fruit, but we don’t know yet, we don’t know about the payment because they asked to cut it down and we only cut it down, but we don’t know about the money, all we know is that when the coffee can be sold, we will sell it to Japan and NCBA and we can get money.” She added.
She continued, so far, employees of the Ministry of Agriculture, Animal Husbandry, Fisheries and Forestry have not come here to his fields to control and see the coffee and its plants, and there is no orientation to rehabilitate coffee that is no longer productive, the only ones who come there are NCBA who provide orientation to cut down coffee but until now they have not paid, coffee rehabilitation has started last year from September to October but in 2024 there has been no coffee rehabilitation.
On that occasion, the Head of Leobasa Village, Alfredo Maia Pires, said that climate change only impacts coffee, but there have been no results for other production results, therefore handling of coffee prices is very necessary and setting prices that remain the same as this year so that people can get income.
“For the past two years we have known that climate change only affects coffee, coffee has results but not other products and this coffee has a good price but it needs to be conveyed to the government so that the price of coffee this year is maintained because the current price can make agriculture feel the impact.” Said the Village Head
He said, this year the price of coffee is quite good because there are three companies that buy in the sub-village at different prices, uch as 0.50 cents and 0.60 cents. However, Japanese companies buy at a high price for coffee with the skin.
“Here, ripe coffee costs 0.50 or 0.60 cents and there is also coffee bought by Japan 1 kg for 3.50 dollars and Timor Global for 2.50 dollars, a few years ago the price of coffee was not good, only in the era of the ninth government the price of coffee is good.” He said.
He emphasized that in this sub-village there are no employees from the relevant ministry who are taking care of coffee rehabilitation and also do not know about the community coffee rehabilitation which is paid 40%, so far in Leobasa there is Mercy Corp who comes to see the coffee, maybe there is no funding.
In addition, this Media Tour program was held because the Association of Timor-Leste Journalists (AJTL) collaborated with Oxfam in Timor-Leste which received funding from Oxfam Hong Kong.
Reported by : Estefania
Picture by : Estefania