Mogiana is one of the oldest coffee-growing regions in Brazil. The region is named after the Companhia Mogiana, who owned the railways that traversed the mountainous coffee regions. The train line was known as “The Coffee Train” for its role in facilitating early coffee production and exportation.
Mogiana is a valley region that runs along São Paulo’s border with Minas. The region has a long history of growing coffee, which dates back to the 1800s. Today, more than 1 million bags of coffee are grown in the Mogiana Valley annually.
With its deep, richly red soil, Mogiana has a range of unique range of microclimates that are each renowned for particular cup notes.
Most coffee farms in Mogiana sit on a plateau of mountains at 900 to 1,050 meters aboves sea level. The average monthly temperatures are 21 degrees Celsius in the summer and 17 degrees in the winter.
Most Brazilian coffee is grown on huge farms, built and equipped for mechanical harvesting and processing that are designed to maximize productivity. The relatively flat landscape across many of Brazil’s coffee regions combined with high minimum wages has led most farms to opt for this type of mechanical harvesting over selective hand-picking.
In the past, this mechanization meant that strip-picking was the norm. However, today’s mechanical harvesters are increasingly sensitive, meaning that farms can selectively harvest only fully ripe cherries at each pass. This is great news for specialty-oriented producers.
In many cases and on less level sections of farms, a mixed form of ‘manual mechanized’ harvesting may be used. The derricadeira – a sort of mechanized rake that uses vibration to harvest ripe cherry - can be used to selectively pick ripe cherry more quickly and cost-effectively than individual hand pickers. A tarp is spanned between coffee trees to capture the cherry as it falls.
With the aid of these newer, more selective technologies, there’s a growing number of farms that are increasingly concerned with – and able to deliver - cup quality.
After harvest, cherry is typically laid to dry in thin layers on patios. Under direct sunlight, cherry is carefully monitored and turned frequently.
