El Salvador Study Abroad 2010: El Jabali Coffee Cooperative

Today we had the awesome opportunity to visit the coffee bean, free-trade plantation. Although, I do not drink coffee, I have a new found respect for coffee farmers. A lot of time and effort is taken in order to make coffee to be 100% free of chemicals, meaning organic. Miguel, the head of the coop was most helpful and so humble. I thank him very much for taking time on a Sunday afternoon to show us around and to explain the long process of making coffee. It starts from harvesting the beans to then putting the beans through a very expensive machine ($40,000 or so), then the beans are laid out to dry and then the beans are roasted in a over 400 degree machine (see video below). Miguel gave us the opportunity of being able to package our own coffee. It is truly amazing, how far coffee making has come in terms of the process. There used to be much more manual work involved and now very expensive machines are being used in the name of efficiency. I found it interesting, how if coffee were to be made in the U.S., immigrants would be the ones who would most likely be hired to do the manual work. The same immigrants that they don't want in their country, but nonetheless they would use for cheap labor. The truth of the matter is that these people are extremely hard working, and they would do anything in order to be able to send money to their families back in their country since they only make about $3/day in their own country. Yes, they are willing to do all of the "dirty" work that the rest of us Americans refuse to do. The U.S. government and the people need to change their frame of thinking regarding these immigration issues, sometimes its just not black and white.