{"id":14944,"date":"2018-09-28T20:09:39","date_gmt":"2018-09-28T20:09:39","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.golive.clarku.edu\/news\/2018\/09\/28\/clark-professors-are-helping-puerto-rico-brew-a-better-coffee-industry\/"},"modified":"2025-09-03T14:35:20","modified_gmt":"2025-09-03T18:35:20","slug":"clark-professors-are-helping-puerto-rico-brew-a-better-coffee-industry","status":"publish","type":"story","link":"https:\/\/www.clarku.edu\/news\/2018\/09\/28\/clark-professors-are-helping-puerto-rico-brew-a-better-coffee-industry\/","title":{"rendered":"Clark professors are helping Puerto Rico brew a better coffee industry"},"content":{"rendered":"\n\n\n

IDCE Professors Cynthia Caron ’90 and\u00a0Ram\u00f3n Borges-M\u00e9ndez<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Island slowly rebuilds a year after Hurricane Maria\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In September 2017, two hurricanes barreled through Puerto Rico, leaving unprecedented devastation in their wake. Power was wiped out across the island, lines of communication were cut, and hundreds of thousands of homes were demolished or heavily damaged. Coffee producers \u2014 farmers, roasters, and shop owners \u2014 were hit especially hard, with almost 80 percent of the island\u2019s coffee trees destroyed.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Coffee holds an important place in Puerto Rico\u2019s history and culture. In 1898, the year it became a territory of the United States, the island was the sixth-largest coffee producer in the world. Virtually all of the coffee crop was lost when Hurricane San Felipe II<\/a> struck the island in 1928, but as recently as 2012, coffee was still the fifth most important agricultural revenue stream in Puerto Rico\u2019s gross national product. Last year\u2019s storms, however, have left the industry with an uncertain future.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Ram\u00f3n Borges-M\u00e9ndez<\/a>, associate professor of community development and planning<\/a> in the International Development, Community, and Environment Department<\/a> at Clark, is a native of Puerto Rico. He and fellow IDCE faculty member Cynthia Caron \u201990<\/a> are using the reconstruction of Puerto Rico\u2019s coffee industry as a case study in resilience, with an eye toward giving women a larger role in the supply chain.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWomen have always been a very important part of the labor force in coffee, usually in subordinate positions and as low-wage workers,\u201d says Borges-M\u00e9ndez. Now, women with graduate degrees and professional backgrounds are assuming leadership positions within the industry.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Caron, an assistant professor of international development and social change<\/a> who has studied post-disaster management and reconstruction in countries including Sri Lanka, Bhutan, India, Zambia, and Uganda, is interested in how local people respond to a major disruption, such as a natural disaster. In Puerto Rico, women are embracing the challenge of recovery, she says.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"Telegram-logo\"<\/a>
Read an interview<\/a> with Prof. Ram\u00f3n Borges-M\u00e9ndez and Prof. Cynthia Caron in the Worcester Telegram and Gazette.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Supported by a grant from Clark\u2019s Faculty Development Fund, the professors have interviewed people from all aspects of the coffee-production chain: owners, producers, farmers, workers, roasters, and shop owners. They spoke with Karen Bengoa, M.A.\/IDSC \u201906, an extension agricultural specialist with the University of Puerto Rico\u2013Mayaguez (in the coffee-producing region), as well as Krys Rodr\u00edguez, a retired Army sergeant major and coffee farm owner, and coffee entrepreneur Jacqueline P\u00e9rez. All were profiled recently on The World<\/a> (Public Radio International) and BBC News<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Their interviews uncovered a desire to \u201cbuild back better,\u201d Borges-M\u00e9ndez says, with an emerging view of development that takes into account equity in gender, class, and geographic region. Puerto Rico\u2019s small coffee producers should focus on niche coffees, he adds, to stand out against the 85 percent of the island\u2019s coffee production (roasting) that is now under the umbrella of Puerto Rican Coffee Roasters \u2014 a subsidiary of Puerto Rico Coca-Cola Bottling.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIt\u2019s a good time to do something different,\u201d Caron says.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

To that end, a group of female stakeholders, including Rodriguez and P\u00e9rez, are looking to repossess or purchase a public school in the town of Maricao \u2014 one of 285 schools that the government has closed since Hurricane Maria \u2014 to establish a sustainability school for agricultural development and community with an emphasis on women\u2019s education. Borges-M\u00e9ndez and Caron will be involved in an advisory capacity.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cA lot of women are already managing their own farms,\u201d Caron says, \u201cbut aren\u2019t legally the owners, and might have difficulty managing men who work on the farms. How do you give women the tools they need, and how do you work with men so the women are able to actually do their jobs and be respected as decision-makers?\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Women are traditionally on the front lines of community development, Borges-M\u00e9ndez adds, because it\u2019s considered an extension of the home.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The professors have written a paper about their ongoing work in Puerto Rico, \u201cDecolonizing Resilience,\u201d which takes into account the colonial history of the island and how policy delays progress. The paper is currently under review.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As well as his work with Caron, Borges-M\u00e9ndez is working with IDCE Professor Yelena Ogneva-Himmelberger<\/a> to create student research projects in GIS and environmental modeling courses, using the case of Puerto Rico after Hurricane Maria.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Island slowly rebuilds a year after Hurricane Maria<\/p>\n","protected":false},"featured_media":14945,"template":"","meta":{"story_color":"#525250","story_headerImg":14945,"section_label":"","footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[241,245,239],"displayed_author":[258],"featured":[],"topic":[232,252,283,132,150,160,332,270,289,162,171],"class_list":["post-14944","story","type-story","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-environment-sustainability","category-social-sciences","category-worcester-world","displayed_author-melissa-lynch-95-mspc-15","topic-alumni","topic-alumni-stories","topic-centers-and-institutes","topic-environment-and-sustainability","topic-faculty","topic-faculty-research","topic-institutes-and-centers","topic-international-development-community-and-environment-department","topic-major-in-international-development-and-social-change","topic-research","topic-social-justice"],"yoast_head":"\nClark professors are helping Puerto 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