Finca Chico

There have been big developments at Francisco (Chico) Rojas Camacho’s farm, Finca Chico in the last few years, the largest of which was completion of a new house on the farm to accommodate farm labourers. Traditionally, Chico has been able to employ local people to help on the farm with the harvest and associated work but in more recent years, they found most available labourers are coming from Panama. There is a rich history of migratory labour in the coffee growing regions of central America, but one of the differences now is that the workers come with their whole families and stay for longer. So, to attract workers Chico has invested in the farm infrastructure. This was not a small undertaking and building materials in Costa Rica, like in the UK, are expensive. To mitigate the costs somewhat, Chico was able to build the house from pine trees on the farm. An unexpected but welcome benefit that Chico has found is that as the workers are more comfortable, and their families are well taken care of, the coffee was harvested in a more relaxed manner and this showed in the quality of the fruit that was collected.