Country of origin: El Salvador
Farm: El Carmen
Owner: Fernando Alfaro & Family
Processing: Anaerobic Natural
Altitude: 1300 meters above sea level
Varietal: Orange Bourbon
Back in March, as early spring was beginning to emerge, you may remember we had a fantastic Roaster’s Choice from El Carmen Estate in El Salvador.
Well, as we begin to close out the summer, with those chilly, darker autumn mornings just around the corner, we thought what better way to see out the season than with another edition from El Carmen Estate.
We’ve managed to secure a sack from this year’s harvest, and we can’t wait to share it with you. I’m particularly excited about this one, as it was on the blind cupping table during my most recent visit to Glasgow. When I first tasted it, I immediately turned to Stephen, our account manager at Mercanta, and said, “I want this one.”
Little did I know, he already knew I’d want it and had allocated us a sack! He knows us well!
We took a look at the El Carmen Estate, The Orange Bourbon varietal and the anaerobic processing back in March. If you would like to take another look and refresh your memory you can click here.
El Salvador & Coffee: El Salvador is famous for its high quality specialty coffee, grown in rich volcanic soils across verdant mountain ranges. Around 90% of the country’s coffee is grown under shade and an estimated 80% of El Salvador’s forests are associated with these shaded coffee plantations. This makes coffee production an important part of both the country’s agricultural landscape and its natural environment.
El Salvador is also the birthplace of the famous Pacamara coffee varietal, which we showcased in one of our previous Roaster’s Choice coffees, Calama La Paz from Bolivia.
Coffee was first introduced to El Salvador around 1740 as a small scale garden crop for domestic use, likely brought from Africa via the Caribbean island of Martinique. For more than a century, coffee was grown in relatively small quantities and remained a minor product, primarily used locally.
At the time, indigo, a natural dye, was El Salvador’s main export. However, as synthetic chemical dyes began to replace natural indigo, the country needed a new source of income to help drive its economy. With its stable tropical climate, lush, shaded high altitude mountains and nutrient rich volcanic soils, El Salvador offered near perfect conditions for growing coffee.
Leaders such as President Gerardo Barrios actively encouraged coffee cultivation during the 1850s and 1860s, offering tax breaks, land grants and military exemptions for farm workers. These incentives helped coffee production expand rapidly.
By 1880, coffee had successfully replaced indigo as El Salvador’s principal export and had become the driving force of the country’s economy. Large scale commercial production continued to grow throughout the 19th century, shaping El Salvador’s economy, landscape and history for more than a century.
In the 1900s, coffee would come to dictate much of El Salvador’s history, offering a real rollercoaster of ups and downs for its people. During the early part of the century, coffee transformed El Salvador into an economic powerhouse, but that prosperity also came at a significant social cost, fuelling deep inequality, political unrest and, ultimately, a devastating civil war.
The Golden Era — 1900s to 1920s
Coffee became known as “el grano de oro” the golden grain and came to dominate the Salvadoran economy, accounting for more than 90% of the country’s exports.
But this newfound prosperity was far from evenly distributed. As coffee production expanded, government reforms abolished communal and indigenous lands, allowing vast areas to be consolidated into large coffee plantations. Land and wealth became increasingly concentrated in the hands of a very small and powerful elite.
This group became known as “The 14 Families”, a term commonly used to describe the wealthy landowning families who came to dominate much of El Salvador’s coffee industry, economy and political life.
The Great Depression and “La Matanza” (1930s)
The 1929 global stock-market crash caused coffee prices to collapse, severely damaging El Salvador’s coffee-dependent economy. Falling export revenues led to widespread unemployment, poverty, and extremely low wages for agricultural workers.
In 1932, Indigenous peasants and other rural workers, influenced by communist organizers including Farabundo Martí, launched an uprising against harsh economic and social conditions. The government, led by dictator Maximiliano Hernández Martínez, responded with a brutal military crackdown known as La Matanza (“The Massacre”). Estimates of those killed vary, but as many as 30,000 people may have died. The repression also contributed to the suppression of Indigenous cultural identity and traditions for decades afterward.
Technical Innovation and High Yields (1950s–1970s)
El Salvador’s coffee industry recovered and expanded during the postwar period. The country became known for efficient production, high yields, and high-quality Arabica coffee.
One important development was the discovery of the Pacas coffee variety. In 1949, farmer Alberto Pacas identified a natural mutation of the Bourbon variety on his farm. The variety was later named Pacas after his family. Pacas was subsequently crossed with Maragogipe, a coffee variety known for its exceptionally large beans, to create Pacamara. Both Pacas and Pacamara remain important coffee varieties in El Salvador and other coffee-growing countries.
By the 1970s, El Salvador had become the world’s fourth-largest coffee producer, and coffee was one of the country’s most important sources of export income. The industry maintained a strong international reputation for quality until the political and economic upheaval of the following decade.
Civil War and Decline (1980s–1990s)
The Salvadoran Civil War (1980–1992) severely disrupted the country’s coffee industry. Fighting damaged rural communities, farms, transportation networks, and other agricultural infrastructure. Guerrilla activity, sabotage, insecurity, and economic instability made it increasingly difficult for farmers to maintain production.
The government also implemented land reform, including the nationalisation of coffee exports and the redistribution of large estates. Although intended to address severe inequalities in land ownership, the reforms disrupted established production systems, while limited access to credit and investment made it difficult for many new landholders to maintain productivity.
Coffee production subsequently declined. Farms were abandoned or damaged during the conflict, while El Salvador also faced increasing competition from other coffee-producing countries. The spread of coffee leaf rust (Hemileia vastatrix) further damaged plantations and contributed to the industry’s difficulties.
By the 1990s, El Salvador’s once-dominant position in the global coffee market had significantly weakened. The combination of civil war, structural economic problems, changing international markets, and agricultural disease left the industry facing a long and difficult recovery.
El Salvador’s Modern Challenges and the Rise of Specialty Coffee
Over the last 25 years, El Salvador has faced and continues to face many challenges within its coffee industry. One of the most damaging was the outbreak of coffee leaf rust in 2012–2013, which severely affected plantations across the country and contributed to a dramatic decline in production. National output fell by around 60%, placing further pressure on an industry that had already been weakened by decades of political and economic instability.
Climate change has added another layer of difficulty. Rising temperatures, changing rainfall patterns, and shifts in humidity are altering the conditions in which coffee can be successfully grown. At the same time, the industry is experiencing labour shortages, as more people move towards urban areas and away from agricultural work. This has left many farms with an ageing workforce, ageing coffee trees, and fewer workers available to maintain and harvest the plantations.
Yet, despite these challenges, El Salvador’s decline in production has created an unexpected advantage when it comes to quality.
Following the Civil War, much of Central America began replacing traditional heirloom coffee varieties with newer, high yielding varieties. The focus increasingly shifted towards producing greater quantities of coffee, sometimes at the expense of the genetic diversity and distinctive characteristics found in traditional varieties.
El Salvador, however, retained a significant number of its heirloom Bourbon trees, as well as varieties such as Pacas and Pacamara. Combined with the country’s mineral-rich volcanic soils and favourable high altitude growing regions, these traditional varieties provide the potential to produce exceptionally sweet, complex, and distinctive coffees.
This has helped El Salvador develop an increasingly important reputation within the specialty coffee industry. Rather than completely replacing traditional varieties with high yielding alternatives, some producers have chosen to preserve their genetic heritage and focus on quality, traceability, and distinctive micro-lots.
The result is a country that may produce relatively little coffee compared with its historical output, but can produce some truly exceptional coffees. El Salvador’s single-origin coffees and high-end micro-lots have received international recognition, including strong performances in competitions such as the Cup of Excellence.
Today, with a population of around 6.4 million, El Salvador accounts for less than 1% of global coffee production and ranks around 21st among the world’s coffee-producing countries. Annual production is roughly 560,000–586,000 sixty kilogram bags.
So, while El Salvador may no longer compete with the world’s largest producers in terms of volume, it has found a different place within the coffee world. We’ve seen in recent years with some of the exceptional coffees from El Salvador that we’ve had here at Carvetii and personally it’s fast becoming one of my favourite coffee origins.
What to expect in the cup: El Salvador is famed for its sweet coffees and this anaerobic natural offering is no different. The cup opens with bright, colourful and juicy tones of lychee, before developing into a boiled-sweet or Haribo-esque sweetness, with tropical vibes lingering throughout. As the cup begins to cool, a rich blood orange character emerges, bringing vibrant citrus tones that see the cup through to a long, refreshing finish.
Final thoughts
Thank you for taking the time to read this post, learn more about the history of coffee in El Salvador and understand why and how this incredible country continues to produce such excellent coffees. We’re proud to showcase these exceptional coffees and perhaps most importantly, the remarkable stories that come with them. If you’ve enjoyed this coffee as much as I have, you’ll be pleased to know that we have another batch waiting to be roasted, which will be available sometime over the next couple of months. So, if you’ve missed out this time, keep an eye out for the next release!
Warm regards,
Shane
Head Roaster
