As a child Andres F. Rodriguez spent his school holidays at his grandpa’s coffee farm in the Quindio region of Colombia. Nestled among the Andes Mountains, the area’s coffee growing culture is so important to the country that in 2011 the government successfully bid to have it protected on the World Heritage List. Growing up in the nearby Calarcá, Andres loved nothing more than to retreat from the bustle of the town to the sanctuary of the farms.

“I have always loved the whole coffee producing process,” says Andres, Founder of Crop Del Monte. “So much so that when I was old enough I enrolled in university to study agricultural engineering.”

As a student Andres learnt about the chemistry behind growing coffee, spending his university years meeting with farmers and building important relationships for the years to come.

“After university I worked with the Colombian government, which allowed me to meet more coffee growers and learn more about the importance of our coffee growing heritage,” Andres says.  In 2008, Andres moved to Australia to study English. It was here that the idea for his future business began to develop.

“In the beginning I didn’t take too much notice of Australia’s coffee industry,” he says. “But after a little while I began to see how interested Australians were in specialty coffee – it was then that I began thinking I should make the most of my background.”

Andres spent a few years getting to know the Australian market. Then in 2012, he imported his first shipment of green beans from Quindio, the area he grew up in.

“I travel back to my home and I source the beans myself,” Andres says. “I visit the farmers directly to form the connections and to teach them proper processing techniques.”

While starting off selling to roasters in close proximity to its warehouse in Brisbane, Crop Del Monte is now selling green beans around Australia. He has also began sourcing beans from different regions of Colombia, including Tolima, Cauca, Huila, Nariño, Cundinamarca, and Antioquia.

“Our customers are smaller businesses,” Andres says. “They are boutique roasters who want the best quality beans.”

Andres says over the last five years the quality of Colombian coffee has been improving year-on-year.

“We’ve recently started exporting micro-lots to ensure we get the best pick of a crop,” he says. “Because the landscape is so diverse and altitudes so varied, the beans can be different from one end of the farm to the other.”

Andres says his business has mostly grown through word of mouth. He says it’s important to his customers that the farmers receive a fair price, so they recommend him to other likeminded roasters.

“We base our price on flavour and quality, so we pay a good premium to our farmers,” he says. “I get to see first hand that what they’ve earned is going towards fixing up their houses, their farms, their kids’ education.”

Living in Australia has given Andres the opportunity to work with local barista champions, judge regional coffee championships, and attend the Colombian Cup of Excellence as an International Judge.

“For the farmers I spend time with when I’m back in Colombia, coffee is their entire life and they want to feel like they are doing something worthwhile,” says Andres. “I tell them Australia is passionate about their coffee, I share photos of their coffee being used in cuppings with over 50 people – I try to provide that link between farmer and roaster.”

Andres says growing coffee in Colombia can definitely be tough, but he feels blessed to get to witness the positive impact his work is having, in an industry so important to his country.

“Not only do I get to travel home every year but I get to see the people I grew up with,” he says. “To see the names of those farms on the packaging at the café counter – that is extremely rewarding.”